SSB Pattern and DMRS Design for PBCH IN 5G NR

ABSTRACT

Devices, systems and methods for a fifth generation (5G) or new radio (NR) system comprising multiplexing, by a gNodeB (gNB), a physical broadcast channel (PBCH) and an associated demodulation reference signal (DMRS) in a time division multiplexing (TDM) manner; and transmitting, by the gNB, the PBCH by employing a Discrete Fourier Transform-spread-orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (DFT-s-OFDM) waveform and its associated DMRS.

PRIORITY CLAIM

The present disclosure claims priority to U.S. Prov. Appln. Ser. No.62/818,369 filed Mar. 14, 2019; the disclosure of which is incorporatedherewith by reference.

BACKGROUND

In 5G NR, the synchronization signal block (SSB) consists of a primarysynchronization signal (PSS), a secondary synchronization signal (SSS),and a physical broadcast signal (PBCH). In NR Release 15, a systemdesign is targeted for carrier frequencies up to 52.6 GHz with awaveform choice of cyclic-prefix orthogonal frequency divisionmultiplexing (CP-OFDM) for DL and UL, and additionally, a DiscreteFourier Transform-spread-OFDM (DFT-s-OFDM) for UL. However, for carrierfrequency above 52.6 GHz, a single waveform choice may be needed tohandle issues including low power amplifier (PA) efficiency and largephase noise may make a choice of waveforms.

SUMMARY

The exemplary embodiments relate to a method of wireless communicationfor a fifth generation (5G) or new radio (NR) system comprisingmultiplexing, by a gNodeB (gNB), a physical broadcast channel (PBCH) andan associated demodulation reference signal (DMRS) in a time divisionmultiplexing (TDM) manner; and transmitting, by the gNB, the PBCH byemploying a Discrete Fourier Transform-spread-orthogonalfrequency-division multiplexing (DFT-s-OFDM) waveform and its associatedDMRS.

The exemplary embodiments further relate to a method of operating a gNBin a fifth generation (5G) new radio (NR) system comprising multiplexinga physical broadcast channel (PBCH) and a secondary synchronizationsignal (SSS) in a time

division multiplexing (TDM) manner; and transmitting, or causingtransmission of, the PBCH and the SSS by employing a Discrete FourierTransform-spread-orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (DFT-s-OFDM)waveform.

The exemplary embodiments further relate to a base station comprisingbaseband circuitry configured for multiplexing a physical broadcastchannel (PBCH) and an associated demodulation reference signal (DMRS) ina time division multiplexing (TDM) manner; and radio front end circuitryconfigured for transmitting the PBCH by employing a Discrete FourierTransform-spread-orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (DFT-s-OFDM)waveform and its associated DMRS.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 illustrates an example architecture of a system of a network inaccordance with various exemplary embodiments.

FIG. 2 illustrates an example of infrastructure equipment in accordancewith various exemplary embodiments.

FIG. 3 illustrates an example of a platform (or “device”) in accordancewith various exemplary embodiments.

FIG. 4 illustrates example components of baseband circuitry and radiofront end modules (RFEM) in accordance with various exemplaryembodiments.

FIG. 5 is a block diagram illustrating components, according to someexample embodiments, able to read instructions from a machine-readableor computer-readable medium (e.g., a non-transitory machine-readablestorage medium) and perform any one or more of the methodologiesdiscussed herein.

FIG. 6 illustrates various protocol functions that may be implemented ina wireless communication device according to various exemplaryembodiments.

FIG. 7 illustrates an SSB pattern in 5G NR.

FIG. 8 illustrates four exemplary options for SSB patterns when the PBCHand DMRS span 2 symbols and have different bandwidths from the PSS/SSS.

FIG. 9 illustrates the DFT-s-OFDM waveform for the transmission of thePBCH.

FIG. 10 illustrates examples of SSB patterns when the PBCH and DMRS span3 symbols and have the same bandwidth as the PSS/SSS.

FIG. 11 illustrates examples of SSB patterns when the PBCH and DMRS span3 symbols and have different bandwidths from the PSS/SSS.

FIG. 12 illustrates examples of SSB patterns when the SSS is used as theDMRS for the PBCH.

FIG. 13 illustrates examples of SSS patterns when the SSS and DMRS areused for channel estimation of the PBCH.

FIG. 14 illustrates examples of DMRS patterns for the PBCH.

FIG. 15 illustrates an example for PT-RS and PBCH multiplexing in onePBCH symbol, where Nsc indicates the number of subcarriers per RB.

FIG. 16 shows a method for transmitting an SSB in 5G NR according tovarious exemplary embodiments described herein.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

The following detailed description refers to the accompanying drawings.The same reference numbers may be used in different drawings to identifythe same or similar elements. In the following description, for purposesof explanation and not limitation, specific details are set forth suchas particular structures, architectures, interfaces, techniques, etc. inorder to provide a thorough understanding of the various aspects ofvarious embodiments. However, it will be apparent to those skilled inthe art having the benefit of the present disclosure that the variousaspects of the various embodiments may be practiced in other examplesthat depart from these specific details. In certain instances,descriptions of well-known devices, circuits, and methods are omitted soas not to obscure the description of the various embodiments withunnecessary detail. For the purposes of the present document, the phrase“A or B” means (A), (B), or (A and B).

The exemplary embodiments may be further understood with reference tothe following description and the related appended drawings and slides,wherein like elements are provided with the same reference numerals. Theexemplary embodiments describe devices, systems and methods fortransmitting a synchronization signal block (SSB) on the downlink in a5G NR network arrangement.

In 5G NR, the synchronization signal block (SSB) consists of a primarysynchronization signal (PSS), a secondary synchronization signal (SSS),and a physical broadcast signal (PBCH). As shown in FIG. 7 , the SSBspans 4 symbols and occupies 240 subcarriers (20 physical resourceblocks (PRB)) within one slot and the SSB symbol follows the order ofPSS, PBCH, SSS and PBCH. Further, the PSS and SSS span 1 orthogonalfrequency-division multiplexing (OFDM) symbol and occupy 12 PRBs. ThePSS is defined based on a length-127 BPSK modulated M-sequence, which isused to provide an OFDM symbol timing estimate, a coarse frequencyoffset estimate and partial cell ID information. The SSS has 1008sequences and is defined based on a length-127 BPSK modulated and XOR oftwo M-sequences, which is used to provide cell identity.

In 5G NR, the PBCH occupies 20 PRBs in frequency in non-SSS OFDM symbolswithin one SSB. In an SSS OFDM symbol, an additional 8 PRBs are used forPBCH transmission. In particular, the PBCH is used to provide timinginformation including an OFDM symbol index, a slot index in a radioframe and a radio frame number from an SSB. In addition, it is used tocarry part of the Minimum System Information (MSI), and controlconfiguration information for the remaining MSI (RMSI).

In NR Release 15, a system design is targeted for carrier frequencies upto 52.6 GHz with a waveform choice of cyclic-prefix orthogonal frequencydivision multiplexing (CP-OFDM) for DL and UL, and additionally, aDiscrete Fourier Transform-spread-OFDM (DFT-s-OFDM) for UL. However, forcarrier frequency above 52.6 GHz, it is envisioned that a singlecarrier-based waveform is needed to handle issues including low poweramplifier (PA) efficiency and large phase noise.

For a single carrier-based waveform, DFT-s-OFDM and single carrier withfrequency domain equalizer (SC-FDE) can be considered for both DL andUL. For an OFDM-based transmission scheme including DFT-s-OFDM, a cyclicprefix (CP) is inserted at the beginning of each block, where the lastdata symbols in a block are repeated as the CP. Typically, the length ofthe CP exceeds the maximum expected delay spread in order to overcomethe inter-symbol interference (ISI).

If DFT-s-OFDM is used for the transmission of the PBCH, the SSB patternand PBCH need to be redesigned to keep a low peak-to-average power ratio(PAPR) for the DL. The exemplary embodiments described herein disclosesynchronization signal block (SSB) patterns and Demodulation referencesignal (DMRS) designs for the physical broadcast channel (PBCH) forsystem operations above a 52.6 GHz carrier frequency. In particular, asynchronization signal block (SSB) pattern for DFT-s-OFDM waveform and aDMRS design for PBCH for a DFT-s-OFDM based waveform are disclosed.

System Architecture

FIG. 1 illustrates an example architecture of a system 100 of a networkin accordance with various exemplary embodiments. The followingdescription is provided for an example system 100 that operates inconjunction with the 5G NR system standards as provided by 3GPPtechnical specifications. However, the exemplary embodiments are notlimited in this regard and the described embodiments may apply to othernetworks that benefit from the principles described herein, such aslegacy (e.g. LTE) 3GPP systems, future 3GPP systems (e.g., SixthGeneration (6G) systems), IEEE 802.16 protocols (e.g., WMAN, WiMAX,etc.), or the like.

As shown in FIG. 1 , the system 100 includes UE 101 a and UE 101 b(collectively referred to as “UEs 101” or “UE 101”). In this example,UEs 101 are illustrated as smartphones (e.g., handheld touchscreenmobile computing devices connectable to one or more cellular networks),but may also comprise any mobile or non-mobile computing device, such asconsumer electronics devices, cellular phones, smartphones, featurephones, tablet computers, wearable computer devices, personal digitalassistants (PDAs), pagers, wireless handsets, desktop computers, laptopcomputers, in-vehicle infotainment (IVI), in-car entertainment (ICE)devices, an Instrument Cluster (IC), head-up display (HUD) devices,onboard diagnostic (OBD) devices, dashtop mobile equipment (DME), mobiledata terminals (MDTs), Electronic Engine Management System (EEMS),electronic/engine control units (ECUs), electronic/engine controlmodules (ECMs), embedded systems, microcontrollers, control modules,engine management systems (EMS), networked or “smart” appliances, MTCdevices, M2M, IoT devices, and/or the like.

In some embodiments, any of the UEs 101 may be IoT UEs, which maycomprise a network access layer designed for low-power IoT applicationsutilizing short-lived UE connections. An IoT UE can utilize technologiessuch as M2M or MTC for exchanging data with an MTC server or device viaa PLMN, ProSe or D2D communication, sensor networks, or IoT networks.The M2M or MTC exchange of data may be a machine-initiated exchange ofdata. An IoT network describes interconnecting IoT UEs, which mayinclude uniquely identifiable embedded computing devices (within theInternet infrastructure), with short-lived connections. The IoT UEs mayexecute background applications (e.g., keep-alive messages, statusupdates, etc.) to facilitate the connections of the IoT network.

The UEs 101 may be configured to connect, e.g., communicatively couple,with a radio access network (RAN) 110. In some embodiments, the RAN 110may be a 5G NR RAN, while in other embodiments the RAN 110 may be anE-UTRAN or a legacy RAN, such as a UTRAN or GERAN. As used herein, theterm “5G NR RAN” or the like may refer to a RAN 110 that operates in anNR or 5G system 100, and the term “E-UTRAN” or the like may refer to aRAN 110 that operates in an LTE or 4G system 100. The UEs 101 utilizeconnections (or channels) 103 and 104, respectively, each of whichcomprises a physical communications interface or layer (discussed infurther detail below).

In this example, the connections 103 and 104 are illustrated as an airinterface to enable communicative coupling, and can be consistent withcellular communications protocols, such as a GSM protocol, a CDMAnetwork protocol, a PTT protocol, a POC protocol, a UMTS protocol, a3GPP LTE protocol, a 5G protocol, a NR protocol, and/or any of the othercommunications protocols discussed herein. In embodiments, the UEs 101may directly exchange communication data via a Proximity Services(ProSe) interface 105. The ProSe interface 105 may alternatively bereferred to as a SL interface 105 and may comprise one or more logicalchannels, including but not limited to a PSCCH, a PSSCH, a PSDCH, and aPSBCH.

The UE 101 b is further configured to access a WLAN node 106 (alsoreferred to as “WLAN 106,” “WLAN Termination 106,” “WT 106” or the like)via connection 107. The connection 107 can comprise a local wirelessconnection, such as a connection consistent with any IEEE 802.11protocol, wherein the AP 106 would comprise a wireless fidelity (Wi-Fi®)router.

The RAN 110 includes one or more RAN nodes 111 a and 111 b (collectivelyreferred to as “RAN nodes 111” or “RAN node 111”) that enable theconnections 103 and 104. As used herein, the terms “access node,”“access point,” or the like may describe equipment that provides theradio baseband functions for data and/or voice connectivity between anetwork and one or more users. These access nodes can be referred to asbase stations (BSs), next generation NodeBs (gNBs), RAN nodes, eNBs,NodeBs, RSUs, TRxPs or TRPs, and so forth, and can comprise groundstations (e.g., terrestrial access points) or satellite stationsproviding coverage within a geographic area (e.g., a cell). As usedherein, the term “5G NR RAN node” or the like may refer to a RAN node111 that operates in an NR or 5G system 100 (for example, a gNB), andthe term “E-UTRAN node” or the like may refer to a RAN node 111 thatoperates in an LTE or 4G system 100 (e.g., an eNB). According to variousembodiments, the RAN nodes 111 may be implemented as one or more of adedicated physical device such as a macrocell base station, and/or a lowpower (LP) base station for providing femtocells, picocells or otherlike cells having smaller coverage areas, smaller user capacity, orhigher bandwidth compared to macrocells.

In some embodiments, all or parts of the RAN nodes 111 may beimplemented as one or more software entities running on server computersas part of a virtual network, which may be referred to as a CRAN and/ora virtual baseband unit pool (vBBUP). In these embodiments, the CRAN orvBBUP may implement a RAN function split, such as a PDCP split whereinRRC and PDCP layers are operated by the CRAN/vBBUP and other L2 protocolentities are operated by individual RAN nodes 111; a MAC/PHY splitwherein RRC, PDCP, RLC, and MAC layers are operated by the CRAN/vBBUPand the PHY layer is operated by individual RAN nodes 111; or a “lowerPHY” split wherein RRC, PDCP, RLC, MAC layers and upper portions of thePHY layer are operated by the CRAN/vBBUP and lower portions of the PHYlayer are operated by individual RAN nodes 111. This virtualizedframework allows the freed-up processor cores of the RAN nodes 111 toperform other virtualized applications. In some implementations, anindividual RAN node 111 may represent individual gNB-DUs that areconnected to a gNB-CU via individual F1 interfaces (not shown by FIG. 1). In these implementations, the gNB-DUs may include one or more remoteradio heads or RFEMs (see, e.g., RFEM 215 in FIG. 2 ), and the gNB-CUmay be operated by a server (not shown) that is located in the RAN 110or by a server pool in a similar manner as the CRAN/vBBUP. Additionallyor alternatively, one or more of the RAN nodes 111 may be nextgeneration eNBs (ng-eNBs), which are RAN nodes that provide E-UTRA userplane and control plane protocol terminations toward the UEs 101, andare connected to a 5GC via a 5G NR interface.

In V2X scenarios one or more of the RAN nodes ill may be or act as RoadSide Units (RSUs). The term “Road Side Unit” or “RSU” may refer to anytransportation infrastructure entity used for V2X communications. An RSUmay be implemented in or by a suitable RAN node or a stationary (orrelatively stationary) UE, where an RSU implemented in or by a UE may bereferred to as a “US-type RSU,” an RSU implemented in or by an eNB maybe referred to as an “eNB-type RSU,” an RSU implemented in or by a gNBmay be referred to as a “gNB-type RSU,” and the like. In one example, anRSU is a computing device coupled with radio frequency circuitry locatedon a roadside that provides connectivity support to passing vehicle UEs101 (vUEs 101). The RSU may also include internal data storage circuitryto store intersection map geometry, traffic statistics, media, as wellas applications/software to sense and control ongoing vehicular andpedestrian traffic. The RSU may operate on the 5.9 GHz Direct ShortRange Communications (DSRC) band to provide very low latencycommunications required for high speed events, such as crash avoidance,traffic warnings, and the like. Additionally or alternatively, the RSUmay operate on the cellular V2X band to provide the aforementioned lowlatency communications, as well as other cellular communicationsservices. Additionally or alternatively, the RSU may operate as a Wi-Fihotspot (2.4 GHz band) and/or provide connectivity to one or morecellular networks to provide uplink and downlink communications. Thecomputing device(s) and some or all of the radiofrequency circuitry ofthe RSU may be packaged in a weatherproof enclosure suitable for outdoorinstallation, and may include a network interface controller to providea wired connection (e.g., Ethernet) to a traffic signal controllerand/or a backhaul network.

Any of the RAN nodes 111 can terminate the air interface protocol andcan be the first point of contact for the UEs 101. In some embodiments,any of the RAN nodes 111 can fulfill various logical functions for theRAN 110 including, but not limited to, radio network controller (RNC)functions such as radio bearer management, uplink and downlink dynamicradio resource management and data packet scheduling, and mobilitymanagement.

In some exemplary embodiments, the UEs 101 can be configured tocommunicate using OFDM communication signals with each other or with anyof the RAN nodes 111 over a multicarrier communication channel inaccordance with various communication techniques, such as, but notlimited to, an OFDMA communication technique (e.g., for downlinkcommunications) or a SC-FDMA communication technique (e.g., for uplinkand ProSe or sidelink communications), although the scope of theembodiments is not limited in this respect. The OFDM signals cancomprise a plurality of orthogonal subcarriers.

In some embodiments, a downlink resource grid can be used for downlinktransmissions from any of the RAN nodes 111 to the UEs 101, while uplinktransmissions can utilize similar techniques. The grid can be atime-frequency grid, called a resource grid or time-frequency resourcegrid, which is the physical resource in the downlink in each slot. Sucha time-frequency plane representation is a common practice for OFDMsystems, which makes it intuitive for radio resource allocation. Eachcolumn and each row of the resource grid corresponds to one OFDM symboland one OFDM subcarrier, respectively. The duration of the resource gridin the time domain corresponds to one slot in a radio frame. Thesmallest time-frequency unit in a resource grid is denoted as a resourceelement. Each resource grid comprises a number of resource blocks, whichdescribe the mapping of certain physical channels to resource elements.Each resource block comprises a collection of resource elements; in thefrequency domain, this may represent the smallest quantity of resourcesthat currently can be allocated. There are several different physicaldownlink channels that are conveyed using such resource blocks.

According to various embodiments, the UEs 101 and the RAN nodes 111communicate data (for example, transmit and receive) data over alicensed medium (also referred to as the “licensed spectrum” and/or the“licensed band”) and an unlicensed shared medium (also referred to asthe “unlicensed spectrum” and/or the “unlicensed band”). The licensedspectrum may include channels that operate in the frequency range ofapproximately 400 MHz to approximately 3.8 GHz, whereas the unlicensedspectrum may include the 5 GHz band.

To operate in the unlicensed spectrum, the UEs 101 and the RAN nodes 111may operate using LAA, eLAA, and/or feLAA mechanisms. In theseimplementations, the UEs 101 and the RAN nodes 111 may perform one ormore known medium-sensing operations and/or carrier-sensing operationsin order to determine whether one or more channels in the unlicensedspectrum is unavailable or otherwise occupied prior to transmitting inthe unlicensed spectrum. The medium/carrier sensing operations may beperformed according to a listen-before-talk (LET) protocol.

Listen before talk (LBT) is a mechanism whereby equipment (for example,UEs 101 RAN nodes 111, etc.) senses a medium (for example, a channel orcarrier frequency) and transmits when the medium is sensed to be idle(or when a specific channel in the medium is sensed to be unoccupied).The medium sensing operation may include clear channel assessment (CCA),which utilizes at least energy detection (ED) to determine the presenceor absence of other signals on a channel in order to determine if achannel is occupied or clear. This LBT mechanism allows cellular/LAA(licensed assisted access) networks to coexist with incumbent systems inthe unlicensed spectrum and with other LAA networks. ED may includesensing RF energy across an intended transmission band for a period oftime and comparing the sensed RF energy to a predefined or configuredthreshold.

Typically, the incumbent systems in the 5 GHz band are WLANs based onIEEE 802.11 technologies. WLAN employs a contention-based channel accessmechanism, called CSMA/CA. Here, when a WLAN node (e.g., a mobilestation (MS) such as UE 101, AP 106, or the like) intends to transmit,the WLAN node may first perform CCA before transmission. Additionally, abackoff mechanism is used to avoid collisions in situations where morethan one WLAN node senses the channel as idle and transmits at the sametime. The backoff mechanism may be a counter that is drawn randomlywithin the CWS, which is increased exponentially upon the occurrence ofcollision and reset to a minimum value when the transmission succeeds.The LBT mechanism designed for LAA is somewhat similar to the CSMA/CA ofWLAN. In some implementations, the LBT procedure for DL or ULtransmission bursts including PDSCH or PUSCH transmissions,respectively, may have an LAA contention window that is variable inlength between X and Y ECCA slots, where X and Y are minimum and maximumvalues for the CWSs for LAA. In one example, the minimum CWS for an LAAtransmission may be 9 microseconds (μs); however, the size of the CWSand a MCOT (for example, a transmission burst) may be based ongovernmental regulatory requirements.

The LAA mechanisms are built upon carrier aggregation (CA) technologiesof LTE-Advanced systems. In CA, each aggregated carrier is referred toas a component carrier (CC). A CC may have a bandwidth of 1.4, 3, 5, 10,15 or 20 MHz and a maximum of five CCs can be aggregated, and therefore,a maximum aggregated bandwidth is 100 MHz. In FDD systems, the number ofaggregated carriers can be different for DL and UL, where the number ofUL CCs is equal to or lower than the number of DL component carriers. Insome cases, individual CCs can have a different bandwidth than otherCCs. In TDD systems, the number of CCs as well as the bandwidths of eachCC is usually the same for DL and UL.

CA also comprises individual serving cells to provide individual CCs.The coverage of the serving cells may differ, for example, because CCson different frequency bands will experience different pathloss. Aprimary service cell or PCell may provide a PCC for both UL and DL, andmay handle RRC and NAS related activities. The other serving cells arereferred to as SCells, and each SCell may provide an individual SCC forboth UL and DL. The SCCs may be added and removed as required, whilechanging the PCC may require the UE 101 to undergo a handover. In LAA,eLAA, and feLAA, some or all of the SCells may operate in the unlicensedspectrum (referred to as “LAA SCells”), and the LAA SCells are assistedby a PCell operating in the licensed spectrum. When a UE is configuredwith more than one LAA SCell, the UE may receive UL grants on theconfigured LAA SCells indicating different PUSCH starting positionswithin a same subframe.

The PDSCH carries user data and higher-layer signaling to the UEs 101.The PDCCH carries information about the transport format and resourceallocations related to the PDSCH channel, among other things. It mayalso inform the UEs 101 about the transport format, resource allocation,and HARQ information related to the uplink shared channel. Typically,downlink scheduling (assigning control and shared channel resourceblocks to the UE 101 b within a cell) may be performed at any of the RANnodes 111 based on channel quality information fed back from any of theUEs 101. The downlink resource assignment information may be sent on thePDCCH used for (e.g., assigned to) each of the UEs 101.

The PDCCH uses control channel elements (CCEs) to convey the controlinformation. Before being mapped to resource elements, the PDCCHcomplex-valued symbols may first be organized into quadruplets, whichmay then be permuted using a sub-block interleaver for rate matching.Each PDCCH may be transmitted using one or more of these CCEs, whereeach CCE may correspond to nine sets of four physical resource elementsknown as REGs. Four Quadrature Phase Shift Keying (QPSK) symbols may bemapped to each REG. The PDCCH can be transmitted using one or more CCEs,depending on the size of the DCI and the channel condition. There can befour or more different PDCCH formats defined in LTE with differentnumbers of CCEs (e.g., aggregation level, L=1, 2, 4, or 8).

Some embodiments may use concepts for resource allocation for controlchannel information that are an extension of the above-describedconcepts. For example, some embodiments may utilize an EPDCCH that usesPDSCH resources for control information transmission. The EPDCCH may betransmitted using one or more ECCEs. Similar to above, each ECCE maycorrespond to nine sets of four physical resource elements known as anEREGs. An ECCE may have other numbers of EREGs in some situations.

The RAN nodes 111 may be configured to communicate with one another viainterface 112. In embodiments where the system 100 is an LTE system, theinterface 112 may be an X2 interface 112. The X2 interface may bedefined between two or more RAN nodes 111 (e.g., two or more eNBs andthe like) that connect to EPC 120, and/or between two eNBs connecting toEPC 120. In some implementations, the X2 interface may include an X2user plane interface (X2-U) and an X2 control plane interface (X2-C).The X2-U may provide flow control mechanisms for user data packetstransferred over the X2 interface, and may be used to communicateinformation about the delivery of user data between eNBs. For example,the X2-U may provide specific sequence number information for user datatransferred from a MeNB to an SeNB; information about successful insequence delivery of PDCP protocol data units (PDUs) to a UE 101 from anSeNB for user data; information of PDCP PDUs that were not delivered toa UE 101; information about a current minimum desired buffer size at theSeNB for transmitting to the UE user data; and the like. The X2-C mayprovide intra-LTE access mobility functionality, including contexttransfers from source to target eNBs, user plane transport control,etc.; load management functionality; as well as inter-cell interferencecoordination functionality.

In embodiments where the system 100 is a 5G or NR system, the interface112 may be an Xn interface 112. The Xn interface is defined between twoor more RAN nodes 111 (e.g., two or more gNBs and the like) that connectto 5GC 120, between a RAN node 111 (e.g., a gNB) connecting to 5GC 120and an eNB, and/or between two eNBs connecting to 5GC 120. In someimplementations, the Xn interface may include an Xn user plane (Xn-U)interface and an Xn control plane (Xn-C) interface. The Xn-U may providenon-guaranteed delivery of user plane PDUs and support/provide dataforwarding and flow control functionality. The Xn-C may providemanagement and error handling functionality, functionality to manage theXn-C interface; mobility support for UE 101 in a connected mode (e.g.,CM-CONNECTED) including functionality to manage the UE mobility forconnected mode between one or more RAN nodes 111. The mobility supportmay include context transfer from an old (source) serving RAN node 111to new (target) serving RAN node 111; and control of user plane tunnelsbetween old (source) serving RAN node 111 to new (target) serving RANnode 111. A protocol stack of the Xn-U may include a transport networklayer built on Internet Protocol (IP) transport layer, and a GTP-U layeron top of a UDP and/or IP layer(s) to carry user plane PDUs. The Xn-Cprotocol stack may include an application layer signaling protocol(referred to as Xn Application Protocol (Xn-AP)) and a transport networklayer that is built on SCTP. The SCTP may be on top of an IP layer, andmay provide the guaranteed delivery of application layer messages. Inthe transport IP layer, point-to-point transmission is used to deliverthe signaling PDUs. In other implementations, the Xn-U protocol stackand/or the Xn-C protocol stack may be same or similar to the user planeand/or control plane protocol stack(s) shown and described herein.

The RAN 110 is shown to be communicatively coupled to a core network(CN) 120. The CN 120 may comprise a plurality of network elements 122,which are configured to offer various data and telecommunicationsservices to customers/subscribers (e.g., users of UEs 101) who areconnected to the CN 120 via the RAN 110. The components of the CN 120may be implemented in one physical node or separate physical nodesincluding components to read and execute instructions from amachine-readable or computer-readable medium (e.g., a non-transitorymachine-readable storage medium). In some embodiments, NFV may beutilized to virtualize any or all of the above-described network nodefunctions via executable instructions stored in one or morecomputer-readable storage mediums (described in further detail below). Alogical instantiation of the CN 120 may be referred to as a networkslice, and a logical instantiation of a portion of the CN 120 may bereferred to as a network sub-slice. NFV architectures andinfrastructures may be used to virtualize one or more network functions,alternatively performed by proprietary hardware, onto physical resourcescomprising a combination of industry-standard server hardware, storagehardware, or switches. In other words, NFV systems can be used toexecute virtual or reconfigurable implementations of one or more EPCcomponents/functions.

Generally, the application server 130 may be an element offeringapplications that use IP bearer resources with the core network (e.g.,UMTS PS domain, LTE PS data services, etc.). The application server 130can also be configured to support one or more communication services(e.g., VoIP sessions, PTT sessions, group communication sessions, socialnetworking services, etc.) for the UEs 101 via the CN 120.

In embodiments, the CN 120 may be a 5GC (referred to as “5GC 120” or thelike), and the RAN 110 may be connected with the CN 120 via 5G NRinterface 113. In embodiments, the 5G NR interface 113 may be split intotwo parts, a 5G NR user plane (NG-U) interface 114, which carriestraffic data between the RAN nodes ill and a UPF, and the S1 controlplane (NG-C) interface 115, which is a signaling interface between theRAN nodes 111 and the AMF.

In embodiments, the CN 120 may be a 5G CN (referred to as “5GC 120” orthe like), while in other embodiments, the CN 120 may be an EPC). Wherethe CN 120 is an evolved packet core (EPC) (referred to as “EPC 120” orthe like), the RAN 110 may be connected with the CN 120 via an S1interface 113. In embodiments, the S1 interface 113 may be split intotwo parts, an S1 user plane (S1-U) interface 114, which carries trafficdata between the RAN nodes 111 and the S-GW, and the S1-MME interface115, which is a signaling interface between the RAN nodes 111 and theMME.

Devices/Components

FIG. 2 illustrates an example of infrastructure equipment 200 inaccordance with various exemplary embodiments. The infrastructureequipment 200 (or “system 200”) may be implemented as a base station,radio head, RAN node such as the RAN nodes 111 and/or WLAN node 106shown and described previously, application server(s) 130, and/or anyother element/device discussed herein. In other examples, the system 200could be implemented in or by a UE.

The system 200 includes application circuitry 205, baseband circuitry210, one or more radio front end modules (RFEMs) 215, memory circuitry220, power management integrated circuitry (PMIC) 225, power teecircuitry 230, network controller circuitry 235, network interfaceconnector 240, satellite positioning circuitry 245, and a user interface250. In some embodiments, the device 200 may include additional elementssuch as, for example, memory/storage, display, camera, sensor, orinput/output (I/O) interface. In other embodiments, the componentsdescribed below may be included in more than one device. For example,said circuitries may be separately included in more than one device forCRAN, vBBU, or other like implementations.

Application circuitry 205 includes circuitry such as, but not limited toone or more processors (or processor cores), cache memory, and one ormore of low drop-out voltage regulators (LDOs), interrupt controllers,serial interfaces such as SPI, I2C or universal programmable serialinterface module, real time clock (RTC), timer-counters includinginterval and watchdog timers, general purpose input/output (I/O or IO),memory card controllers such as Secure Digital (SD) MultiMediaCard (MMC)or similar, Universal Serial Bus (USE) interfaces, Mobile IndustryProcessor Interface (MIPI) interfaces and Joint Test Access Group (JTAG)test access ports. The processors (or cores) of the applicationcircuitry 205 may be coupled with or may include memory/storage elementsand may be configured to execute instructions stored in thememory/storage to enable various applications or operating systems torun on the system 200. In some implementations, the memory/storageelements may be on-chip memory circuitry, which may include any suitablevolatile and/or non-volatile memory, such as DRAM, SRAM, EPROM, EEPROM,Flash memory, solid-state memory, and/or any other type of memory devicetechnology, such as those discussed herein.

The processor(s) of application circuitry 205 may include, for example,one or more processor cores (CPUs), one or more application processors,one or more graphics processing units (GPUs), one or more reducedinstruction set computing (RISC) processors, one or more Acorn RISCMachine (ARM) processors, one or more complex instruction set computing(CISC) processors, one or more digital signal processors (DSP), one ormore FPGAs, one or more PLDs, one or more ASICs, one or moremicroprocessors or controllers, or any suitable combination thereof. Insome embodiments, the application circuitry 205 may comprise, or may be,a special-purpose processor/controller to operate according to thevarious embodiments herein. As examples, the processor(s) of applicationcircuitry 205 may include one or more Intel Pentium®, Core®, or Xeon®processor(s); Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) Ryzen® processor(s),Accelerated Processing Units (APUs), or Epyc® processors; ARM-basedprocessor(s) licensed from ARM Holdings, Ltd. such as the ARM Cortex-Afamily of processors and the ThunderX2° provided by Cavium™, Inc.; aMIPS-based design from MIPS Technologies, Inc. such as MIPS WarriorP-class processors; and/or the like. In some embodiments, the system 200may not utilize application circuitry 205, and instead may include aspecial-purpose processor/controller to process IP data received from anEPC or 5GC, for example.

In some implementations, the application circuitry 205 may include oneor more hardware accelerators, which may be microprocessors,programmable processing devices, or the like. The one or more hardwareaccelerators may include, for example, computer vision (CV) and/or deeplearning (DL) accelerators. As examples, the programmable processingdevices may be one or more a field-programmable devices (FPDs) such asfield-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) and the like; programmable logicdevices (PLDs) such as complex PLDs (CPLDs), high-capacity PLDs(HCPLDs), and the like; ASICs such as structured ASICs and the like;programmable SoCs (PSoCs); and the like. In such implementations, thecircuitry of application circuitry 205 may comprise logic blocks orlogic fabric, and other interconnected resources that may be programmedto perform various functions, such as the procedures, methods,functions, etc. of the various embodiments discussed herein. In suchembodiments, the circuitry of application circuitry 205 may includememory cells (e.g., erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM),electrically erasable programmable read-only memory (EEPROM), flashmemory, static memory (e.g., static random access memory (SRAM),anti-fuses, etc.)) used to store logic blocks, logic fabric, data, etc.in look-up-tables (LUTs) and the like.

The baseband circuitry 210 may be implemented, for example, as asolder-down substrate including one or more integrated circuits, asingle packaged integrated circuit soldered to a main circuit board or amulti-chip module containing two or more integrated circuits. Thevarious hardware electronic elements of baseband circuitry 210 arediscussed infra with regard to FIG. 4 .

User interface circuitry 250 may include one or more user interfacesdesigned to enable user interaction with the system 200 or peripheralcomponent interfaces designed to enable peripheral component interactionwith the system 200. User interfaces may include, but are not limitedto, one or more physical or virtual buttons (e.g., a reset button), oneor more indicators (e.g., light emitting diodes (LEDs)), a physicalkeyboard or keypad, a mouse, a touchpad, a touchscreen, speakers orother audio emitting devices, microphones, a printer, a scanner, aheadset, a display screen or display device, etc. Peripheral componentinterfaces may include, but are not limited to, a nonvolatile memoryport, a universal serial bus (USB) port, an audio jack, a power supplyinterface, etc.

The radio front end modules (RFEMs) 215 may comprise a millimeter wave(mmWave) RFEM and one or more sub-mmWave radio frequency integratedcircuits (RFICs). In some implementations, the one or more sub-mmWaveRFICs may be physically separated from the mmWave RFEM. The RFICs mayinclude connections to one or more antennas or antenna arrays (see e.g.,antenna array 411 of FIG. 4 infra), and the RFEM may be connected tomultiple antennas. In alternative implementations, both mmWave andsub-mmWave radio functions may be implemented in the same physical RFEM215, which incorporates both mmWave antennas and sub-mmWave.

The memory circuitry 220 may include one or more of volatile memoryincluding dynamic random access memory (DRAM) and/or synchronous dynamicrandom access memory (SDRAM), and nonvolatile memory (NVM) includinghigh-speed electrically erasable memory (commonly referred to as Flashmemory), phase change random access memory (PRAM), magnetoresistiverandom access memory (MRAM), etc., and may incorporate thethree-dimensional (3D) cross-point (XPOINT) memories from Intel® andMicron®. Memory circuitry 220 may be implemented as one or more ofsolder down packaged integrated circuits, socketed memory modules andplug-in memory cards.

The PMIC 225 may include voltage regulators, surge protectors, poweralarm detection circuitry, and one or more backup power sources such asa battery or capacitor. The power alarm detection circuitry may detectone or more of brown out (under-voltage) and surge (over-voltage)conditions. The power tee circuitry 230 may provide for electrical powerdrawn from a network cable to provide both power supply and dataconnectivity to the infrastructure equipment 200 using a single cable.

The network controller circuitry 235 may provide connectivity to anetwork using a standard network interface protocol such as Ethernet,Ethernet over GRE Tunnels, Ethernet over Multiprotocol Label Switching(MPLS), or some other suitable protocol. Network connectivity may beprovided to/from the infrastructure equipment 200 via network interfaceconnector 240 using a physical connection, which may be electrical(commonly referred to as a “copper interconnect”), optical, or wireless.The network controller circuitry 235 may include one or more dedicatedprocessors and/or FPGAs to communicate using one or more of theaforementioned protocols. In some implementations, the networkcontroller circuitry 235 may include multiple controllers to provideconnectivity to other networks using the same or different protocols.

The positioning circuitry 245 includes circuitry to receive and decodesignals transmitted/broadcasted by a positioning network of a globalnavigation satellite system (GNSS). Examples of navigation satelliteconstellations (or GNSS) include United States' Global PositioningSystem (GPS), Russia's Global Navigation System (GLONASS), the EuropeanUnion's Galileo system, China's BeiDou Navigation Satellite System, aregional navigation system or GNSS augmentation system (e.g., Navigationwith Indian Constellation (NAVIC), Japan's Quasi-Zenith Satellite System(QZSS), France's Doppler Orbitography and Radio-positioning Integratedby Satellite (DORIS), etc.), or the like. The positioning circuitry 245comprises various hardware elements (e.g., including hardware devicessuch as switches, filters, amplifiers, antenna elements, and the like tofacilitate OTA communications) to communicate with components of apositioning network, such as navigation satellite constellation nodes.In some embodiments, the positioning circuitry 245 may include aMicro-Technology for Positioning, Navigation, and Timing (Micro-PNT) ICthat uses a master timing clock to perform position tracking/estimationwithout GNSS assistance. The positioning circuitry 245 may also be partof, or interact with, the baseband circuitry 210 and/or RFEMs 215 tocommunicate with the nodes and components of the positioning network.The positioning circuitry 245 may also provide position data and/or timedata to the application circuitry 205, which may use the data tosynchronize operations with various infrastructure (e.g., RAN nodes 111,etc.), or the like.

The components shown by FIG. 2 may communicate with one another usinginterface circuitry, which may include any number of bus and/orinterconnect (IX) technologies such as industry standard architecture(ISA), extended ISA (EISA), peripheral component interconnect (PCI),peripheral component interconnect extended (PCIx), PCI express (PCIe),or any number of other technologies. The bus/IX may be a proprietarybus, for example, used in a SoC based system. Other bus/IX systems maybe included, such as an I2C interface, an SPI interface, point to pointinterfaces, and a power bus, among others.

FIG. 3 illustrates an example of a platform 300 (or “device 300”) inaccordance with various exemplary embodiments. In embodiments, thecomputer platform 300 may be suitable for use as UEs 101, applicationservers 130, and/or any other element/device discussed herein. Theplatform 300 may include any combinations of the components shown in theexample. The components of platform 300 may be implemented as integratedcircuits (ICs), portions thereof, discrete electronic devices, or othermodules, logic, hardware, software, firmware, or a combination thereofadapted in the computer platform 300, or as components otherwiseincorporated within a chassis of a larger system. The block diagram ofFIG. 3 is intended to show a high level view of components of thecomputer platform 300. However, some of the components shown may beomitted, additional components may be present, and different arrangementof the components shown may occur in other implementations.

Application circuitry 305 includes circuitry such as, but not limited toone or more processors (or processor cores), cache memory, and one ormore of LDOs, interrupt controllers, serial interfaces such as SPI, I2Cor universal programmable serial interface module, RTC, timer-countersincluding interval and watchdog timers, general purpose I/O, memory cardcontrollers such as SD MMC or similar, USB interfaces, MIPI interfaces,and JTAG test access ports. The processors (or cores) of the applicationcircuitry 305 may be coupled with or may include memory/storage elementsand may be configured to execute instructions stored in thememory/storage to enable various applications or operating systems torun on the system 300. In some implementations, the memory/storageelements may be on-chip memory circuitry, which may include any suitablevolatile and/or non-volatile memory, such as DRAM, SRAM, EPROM, EEPROM,Flash memory, solid-state memory, and/or any other type of memory devicetechnology, such as those discussed herein.

The processor(s) of application circuitry 305 may include, for example,one or more processor cores, one or more application processors, one ormore GPUs, one or more RISC processors, one or more ARM processors, oneor more CISC processors, one or more DSP, one or more FPGAs, one or morePLDs, one or more ASICs, one or more microprocessors or controllers, amultithreaded processor, an ultra-low voltage processor, an embeddedprocessor, some other known processing element, or any suitablecombination thereof. In some embodiments, the application circuitry 305may comprise, or may be, a special-purpose processor/controller tooperate according to the various embodiments herein.

As examples, the processor(s) of application circuitry 305 may includean Intel® Architecture Core™ based processor, such as a Quark′, anAtom™, an i3, an i5, an i7, or an MCU-class processor, or another suchprocessor available from Intel® Corporation, Santa Clara, Calif. Theprocessors of the application circuitry 305 may also be one or more ofAdvanced Micro Devices (AMD) Ryzen® processor(s) or AcceleratedProcessing Units (APUs); A5-A9 processor(s) from Apple® Inc.,Snapdragon™ processor(s) from Qualcomm® Technologies, Inc., TexasInstruments, Inc.® Open Multimedia Applications Platform (OMAP)™processor(s); a MIPS-based design from MIPS Technologies, Inc. such asMIPS Warrior M-class, Warrior I-class, and Warrior P-class processors;an ARM-based design licensed from ARM Holdings, Ltd., such as the ARMCortex-A, Cortex-R, and Cortex-M family of processors; or the like. Insome implementations, the application circuitry 305 may be a part of asystem on a chip (SoC) in which the application circuitry 305 and othercomponents are formed into a single integrated circuit, or a singlepackage, such as the Edison′ or Galileo™ SoC boards from Intel®Corporation.

Additionally or alternatively, application circuitry 305 may includecircuitry such as, but not limited to, one or more a field-programmabledevices (FPDs) such as FPGAs and the like; programmable logic devices(PLDs) such as complex PLDs (CPLDs), high-capacity PLDs (HCPLDs), andthe like; ASICs such as structured ASICs and the like; programmable SoCs(PSoCs); and the like. In such embodiments, the circuitry of applicationcircuitry 305 may comprise logic blocks or logic fabric, and otherinterconnected resources that may be programmed to perform variousfunctions, such as the procedures, methods, functions, etc. of thevarious embodiments discussed herein. In such embodiments, the circuitryof application circuitry 305 may include memory cells (e.g., erasableprogrammable read-only memory (EPROM), electrically erasableprogrammable read-only memory (EEPROM), flash memory, static memory(e.g., static random access memory (SRAM), anti-fuses, etc.)) used tostore logic blocks, logic fabric, data, etc. in look-up tables (LUTs)and the like.

The baseband circuitry 310 may be implemented, for example, as asolder-down substrate including one or more integrated circuits, asingle packaged integrated circuit soldered to a main circuit board or amulti-chip module containing two or more integrated circuits. Thevarious hardware electronic elements of baseband circuitry 310 arediscussed infra with regard to FIG. 4 .

The RFEMs 315 may comprise a millimeter wave (mmWave) RFEM and one ormore sub-mmWave radio frequency integrated circuits (RFICs). In someimplementations, the one or more sub-mmWave RFICs may be physicallyseparated from the mmWave RFEM. The RFICs may include connections to oneor more antennas or antenna arrays (see e.g., antenna array 411 of FIG.4 infra), and the RFEM may be connected to multiple antennas. Inalternative implementations, both mmWave and sub-mmWave radio functionsmay be implemented in the same physical RFEM 315, which incorporatesboth mmWave antennas and sub-mmWave.

The memory circuitry 320 may include any number and type of memorydevices used to provide for a given amount of system memory. Asexamples, the memory circuitry 320 may include one or more of volatilememory including random access memory (RAM), dynamic RAM (DRAM) and/orsynchronous dynamic RAM (SDRAM), and nonvolatile memory (NVM) includinghigh-speed electrically erasable memory (commonly referred to as Flashmemory), phase change random access memory (PRAM), magnetoresistiverandom access memory (MRAM), etc. The memory circuitry 320 may bedeveloped in accordance with a Joint Electron Devices EngineeringCouncil (JEDEC) low power double data rate (LPDDR)-based design, such asLPDDR2, LPDDR3, LPDDR4, or the like. Memory circuitry 320 may beimplemented as one or more of solder down packaged integrated circuits,single die package (SDP), dual die package (DDP) or quad die package(Q17P), socketed memory modules, dual inline memory modules (DIMMs)including microDIMMs or MiniDIMMs, and/or soldered onto a motherboardvia a ball grid array (BGA). In low power implementations, the memorycircuitry 320 may be on-die memory or registers associated with theapplication circuitry 305. To provide for persistent storage ofinformation such as data, applications, operating systems and so forth,memory circuitry 320 may include one or more mass storage devices, whichmay include, inter alia, a solid state disk drive (SSDD), hard diskdrive (HDD), a micro HDD, resistance change memories, phase changememories, holographic memories, or chemical memories, among others. Forexample, the computer platform 300 may incorporate the three-dimensional(3D) cross-point (XPOINT) memories from Intel® and Micron®.

Removable memory circuitry 323 may include devices, circuitry,enclosures/housings, ports or receptacles, etc. used to couple portabledata storage devices with the platform 300. These portable data storagedevices may be used for mass storage purposes, and may include, forexample, flash memory cards (e.g., Secure Digital (SD) cards, microSDcards, xD picture cards, and the like), and USB flash drives, opticaldiscs, external HDDs, and the like.

The platform 300 may also include interface circuitry (not shown) thatis used to connect external devices with the platform 300. The externaldevices connected to the platform 300 via the interface circuitryinclude sensor circuitry 321 and electro-mechanical components (EMCs)322, as well as removable memory devices coupled to removable memorycircuitry 323.

The sensor circuitry 321 include devices, modules, or subsystems whosepurpose is to detect events or changes in its environment and send theinformation (sensor data) about the detected events to some other adevice, module, subsystem, etc. Examples of such sensors include, interalia, inertia measurement units (IMUs) comprising accelerometers,gyroscopes, and/or magnetometers; microelectromechanical systems (MEMS)or nanoelectromechanical systems (NEMS) comprising 3-axisaccelerometers, 3-axis gyroscopes, and/or magnetometers; level sensors;flow sensors; temperature sensors (e.g., thermistors); pressure sensors;barometric pressure sensors; gravimeters; altimeters; image capturedevices (e.g., cameras or lensless apertures); light detection andranging (LiDAR) sensors; proximity sensors (e.g., infrared radiationdetector and the like), depth sensors, ambient light sensors, ultrasonictransceivers; microphones or other like audio capture devices; etc.

EMCs 322 include devices, modules, or subsystems whose purpose is toenable platform 300 to change its state, position, and/or orientation,or move or control a mechanism or (sub)system. Additionally, EMCs 322may be configured to generate and send messages/signaling to othercomponents of the platform 300 to indicate a current state of the EMCs322. Examples of the EMCs 322 include one or more power switches, relaysincluding electromechanical relays (EMRs) and/or solid state relays(SSRs), actuators (e.g., valve actuators, etc.), an audible soundgenerator, a visual warning device, motors (e.g., DC motors, steppermotors, etc.), wheels, thrusters, propellers, claws, clamps, hooks,and/or other like electro-mechanical components. In embodiments,platform 300 is configured to operate one or more EMCs 322 based on oneor more captured events and/or instructions or control signals receivedfrom a service provider and/or various clients.

In some implementations, the interface circuitry may connect theplatform 300 with positioning circuitry 345. The positioning circuitry345 includes circuitry to receive and decode signalstransmitted/broadcasted by a positioning network of a GNSS. Examples ofnavigation satellite constellations (or GNSS) include United States'GPS, Russia's GLONASS, the European Union's Galileo system, China'sBeiDou Navigation Satellite System, a regional navigation system or GNSSaugmentation system (e.g., NAVIC), Japan's QZSS, France's DORIS, etc.),or the like. The positioning circuitry 345 comprises various hardwareelements (e.g., including hardware devices such as switches, filters,amplifiers, antenna elements, and the like to facilitate OTAcommunications) to communicate with components of a positioning network,such as navigation satellite constellation nodes. In some embodiments,the positioning circuitry 345 may include a Micro-PNT IC that uses amaster timing clock to perform position tracking/estimation without GNSSassistance. The positioning circuitry 345 may also be part of, orinteract with, the baseband circuitry 310 and/or RFEMs 315 tocommunicate with the nodes and components of the positioning network.The positioning circuitry 345 may also provide position data and/or timedata to the application circuitry 305, which may use the data tosynchronize operations with various infrastructure (e.g., radio basestations), for turn-by-turn navigation applications, or the like.

In some implementations, the interface circuitry may connect theplatform 300 with Near-Field Communication (NFC) circuitry 340. NFCcircuitry 340 is configured to provide contactless, short-rangecommunications based on radio frequency identification (RFID) standards,wherein magnetic field induction is used to enable communication betweenNFC circuitry 340 and NFC-enabled devices external to the platform 300(e.g., an “NFC touchpoint”). NFC circuitry 340 comprises an NFCcontroller coupled with an antenna element and a processor coupled withthe NFC controller. The NFC controller may be a chip/IC providing NFCfunctionalities to the NFC circuitry 340 by executing NFC controllerfirmware and an NFC stack. The NFC stack may be executed by theprocessor to control the NFC controller, and the NFC controller firmwaremay be executed by the NFC controller to control the antenna element toemit short-range RF signals. The RF signals may power a passive NFC tag(e.g., a microchip embedded in a sticker or wristband) to transmitstored data to the NFC circuitry 340, or initiate data transfer betweenthe NFC circuitry 340 and another active NFC device (e.g., a smartphoneor an NFC-enabled POS terminal) that is proximate to the platform 300.

The driver circuitry 346 may include software and hardware elements thatoperate to control particular devices that are embedded in the platform300, attached to the platform 300, or otherwise communicatively coupledwith the platform 300. The driver circuitry 346 may include individualdrivers allowing other components of the platform 300 to interact withor control various input/output (I/O) devices that may be presentwithin, or connected to, the platform 300. For example, driver circuitry346 may include a display driver to control and allow access to adisplay device, a touchscreen driver to control and allow access to atouchscreen interface of the platform 300, sensor drivers to obtainsensor readings of sensor circuitry 321 and control and allow access tosensor circuitry 321, EMC drivers to obtain actuator positions of theEMCs 322 and/or control and allow access to the EMCs 322, a cameradriver to control and allow access to an embedded image capture device,audio drivers to control and allow access to one or more audio devices.

The power management integrated circuitry (PMIC) 325 (also referred toas “power management circuitry 325”) may manage power provided tovarious components of the platform 300. In particular, with respect tothe baseband circuitry 310, the PMIC 325 may control power-sourceselection, voltage scaling, battery charging, or DC-to-DC conversion.The PMIC 325 may often be included when the platform 300 is capable ofbeing powered by a battery 330, for example, when the device is includedin a UE 101.

In some embodiments, the PMIC 325 may control, or otherwise be part of,various power saving mechanisms of the platform 300. For example, if theplatform 300 is in an RRC_Connected state, where it is still connectedto the RAN node as it expects to receive traffic shortly, then it mayenter a state known as Discontinuous Reception Mode (DRX) after a periodof inactivity. During this state, the platform 300 may power down forbrief intervals of time and thus save power. If there is no data trafficactivity for an extended period of time, then the platform 300 maytransition off to an RRC Idle state, where it disconnects from thenetwork and does not perform operations such as channel qualityfeedback, handover, etc. The platform 300 goes into a very low powerstate and it performs paging where again it periodically wakes up tolisten to the network and then powers down again. The platform 300 maynot receive data in this state; in order to receive data, it musttransition back to RRC_Connected state. An additional power saving modemay allow a device to be unavailable to the network for periods longerthan a paging interval (ranging from seconds to a few hours). Duringthis time, the device is totally unreachable to the network and maypower down completely. Any data sent during this time incurs a largedelay and it is assumed the delay is acceptable.

A battery 330 may power the platform 300, although in some examples theplatform 300 may be mounted deployed in a fixed location, and may have apower supply coupled to an electrical grid. The battery 330 may be alithium ion battery, a metal-air battery, such as a zinc-air battery, analuminum-air battery, a lithium-air battery, and the like. In someimplementations, such as in V2X applications, the battery 330 may be atypical lead-acid automotive battery.

In some implementations, the battery 330 may be a “smart battery,” whichincludes or is coupled with a Battery Management System (BMS) or batterymonitoring integrated circuitry. The BMS may be included in the platform300 to track the state of charge (SoCh) of the battery 330. The EMS maybe used to monitor other parameters of the battery 330 to providefailure predictions, such as the state of health (SoH) and the state offunction (SoF) of the battery 330. The BMS may communicate theinformation of the battery 330 to the application circuitry 305 or othercomponents of the platform 300. The EMS may also include ananalog-to-digital (ADC) convertor that allows the application circuitry305 to directly monitor the voltage of the battery 330 or the currentflow from the battery 330. The battery parameters may be used todetermine actions that the platform 300 may perform, such astransmission frequency, network operation, sensing frequency, and thelike.

A power block, or other power supply coupled to an electrical grid maybe coupled with the BMS to charge the battery 330. In some examples, thepower block may be replaced with a wireless power receiver to obtain thepower wirelessly, for example, through a loop antenna in the computerplatform 300. In these examples, a wireless battery charging circuit maybe included in the BMS. The specific charging circuits chosen may dependon the size of the battery 330, and thus, the current required. Thecharging may be performed using the Airfuel standard promulgated by theAirfuel Alliance, the Qi wireless charging standard promulgated by theWireless Power Consortium, or the Rezence charging standard promulgatedby the Alliance for Wireless Power, among others.

User interface circuitry 350 includes various input/output (I/O) devicespresent within, or connected to, the platform 300, and includes one ormore user interfaces designed to enable user interaction with theplatform 300 and/or peripheral component interfaces designed to enableperipheral component interaction with the platform 300. The userinterface circuitry 350 includes input device circuitry and outputdevice circuitry. Input device circuitry includes any physical orvirtual means for accepting an input including, inter alia, one or morephysical or virtual buttons (e.g., a reset button), a physical keyboard,keypad, mouse, touchpad, touchscreen, microphones, scanner, headset,and/or the like. The output device circuitry includes any physical orvirtual means for showing information or otherwise conveyinginformation, such as sensor readings, actuator position(s), or otherlike information. Output device circuitry may include any number and/orcombinations of audio or visual display, including, inter alia, one ormore simple visual outputs/indicators (e.g., binary status indicators(e.g., light emitting diodes (LEDs)) and multi-character visual outputs,or more complex outputs such as display devices or touchscreens (e.g.,Liquid Chrystal Displays (LCD), LED displays, quantum dot displays,projectors, etc.), with the output of characters, graphics, multimediaobjects, and the like being generated or produced from the operation ofthe platform 300. The output device circuitry may also include speakersor other audio emitting devices, printer(s), and/or the like. In someembodiments, the sensor circuitry 321 may be used as the input devicecircuitry (e.g., an image capture device, motion capture device, or thelike) and one or more EMCs may be used as the output device circuitry(e.g., an actuator to provide haptic feedback or the like). In anotherexample, NFC circuitry comprising an NFC controller coupled with anantenna element and a processing device may be included to readelectronic tags and/or connect with another NFC-enabled device.Peripheral component interfaces may include, but are not limited to, anon-volatile memory port, a USB port, an audio jack, a power supplyinterface, etc.

Although not shown, the components of platform 300 may communicate withone another using a suitable bus or interconnect (IX) technology, whichmay include any number of technologies, including ISA, EISA, PCI, PCIx,PCIe, a Time-Trigger Protocol (TTP) system, a FlexRay system, or anynumber of other technologies. The bus/IX may be a proprietary bus/IX,for example, used in a SoC based system. Other bus/IX systems may beincluded, such as an I2C interface, an SPI interface, point-to-pointinterfaces, and a power bus, among others.

FIG. 4 illustrates example components of baseband circuitry 410 andradio front end modules (RFEM) 415 in accordance with various exemplaryembodiments. The baseband circuitry 410 corresponds to the basebandcircuitry 210 and 310 of FIGS. 2 and 3 , respectively. The RFEM 415corresponds to the RFEM 215 and 315 of FIGS. 2 and 3 , respectively. Asshown, the RFEMs 415 may include Radio Frequency (RF) circuitry 406,front-end module (FEM) circuitry 408, antenna array 411 coupled togetherat least as shown.

The baseband circuitry 410 includes circuitry and/or control logicconfigured to carry out various radio/network protocol and radio controlfunctions that enable communication with one or more radio networks viathe RF circuitry 406. The radio control functions may include, but arenot limited to, signal modulation/demodulation, encoding/decoding, radiofrequency shifting, etc. In some embodiments, modulation/demodulationcircuitry of the baseband circuitry 410 may include Fast-FourierTransform (FFT), precoding, or constellation mapping/demappingfunctionality. In some embodiments, encoding/decoding circuitry of thebaseband circuitry 410 may include convolution, tail-biting convolution,turbo, Viterbi, or Low Density Parity Check (LDDC) encoder/decoderfunctionality. Embodiments of modulation/demodulation andencoder/decoder functionality are not limited to these examples and mayinclude other suitable functionality in other embodiments. The basebandcircuitry 410 is configured to process baseband signals received from areceive signal path of the RF circuitry 406 and to generate basebandsignals for a transmit signal path of the RF circuitry 406. The basebandcircuitry 410 is configured to interface with application circuitry205/305 (see FIGS. 2 and 3 ) for generation and processing of thebaseband signals and for controlling operations of the RF circuitry 406.The baseband circuitry 410 may handle various radio control functions.

The aforementioned circuitry and/or control logic of the basebandcircuitry 410 may include one or more single or multi-core processors.For example, the one or more processors may include a 3G basebandprocessor 404A, a 4G/LTE baseband processor 404B, a 5G/NR basebandprocessor 404C, or some other baseband processor(s) 404D for otherexisting generations, generations in development or to be developed inthe future (e.g., sixth generation (6G), etc.). In other embodiments,some or all of the functionality of baseband processors 404A-D may beincluded in modules stored in the memory 404G and executed via a CentralProcessing Unit (CPU) 404E. In other embodiments, some or all of thefunctionality of baseband processors 404A-D may be provided as hardwareaccelerators (e.g., FPGAs, ASICs, etc.) loaded with the appropriate bitstreams or logic blocks stored in respective memory cells. In variousembodiments, the memory 404G may store program code of a real-time OS(RTOS), which when executed by the CPU 404E (or other basebandprocessor), is to cause the CPU 404E (or other baseband processor) tomanage resources of the baseband circuitry 410, schedule tasks, etc.Examples of the RTOS may include Operating System Embedded (OSE)™provided by Enea®, Nucleus RTOS™ provided by Mentor Graphics®, VersatileReal-Time Executive (VRTX) provided by Mentor Graphics®, ThreadX™provided by Express Logic®, FreeRTOS, REX OS provided by Qualcomm®, OKL4provided by Open Kernel (OK) Labs®, or any other suitable RTOS, such asthose discussed herein. In addition, the baseband circuitry 410 includesone or more audio digital signal processor(s) (DSP) 404F. The audioDSP(s) 404F include elements for compression/decompression and echocancellation and may include other suitable processing elements in otherembodiments.

In some embodiments, each of the processors 404A-404E include respectivememory interfaces to send/receive data to/from the memory 404G. Thebaseband circuitry 410 may further include one or more interfaces tocommunicatively couple to other circuitries/devices, such as aninterface to send/receive data to/from memory external to the basebandcircuitry 410; an application circuitry interface to send/receive datato/from the application circuitry 205/305 of FIGS. 2-3 ); an RFcircuitry interface to send/receive data to/from RF circuitry 406 ofFIG. 4 ; a wireless hardware connectivity interface to send/receive datato/from one or more wireless hardware elements (e.g., Near FieldCommunication (NFC) components, Bluetooth®/Bluetooth® Low Energycomponents, Wi-Fi® components, and/or the like); and a power managementinterface to send/receive power or control signals to/from the PMIC 325.

In alternate embodiments (which may be combined with the above describedembodiments), baseband circuitry 410 comprises one or more digitalbaseband systems, which are coupled with one another via an interconnectsubsystem and to a CPU subsystem, an audio subsystem, and an interfacesubsystem. The digital baseband subsystems may also be coupled to adigital baseband interface and a mixed-signal baseband subsystem viaanother interconnect subsystem. Each of the interconnect subsystems mayinclude a bus system, point-to-point connections, network-on-chip (NOC)structures, and/or some other suitable bus or interconnect technology,such as those discussed herein. The audio subsystem may include DSPcircuitry, buffer memory, program memory, speech processing acceleratorcircuitry, data converter circuitry such as analog-to-digital anddigital-to-analog converter circuitry, analog circuitry including one ormore of amplifiers and filters, and/or other like components. In anaspect of the present disclosure, baseband circuitry 410 may includeprotocol processing circuitry with one or more instances of controlcircuitry (not shown) to provide control functions for the digitalbaseband circuitry and/or radio frequency circuitry (e.g., the radiofront end modules 415).

Although not shown by FIG. 4 , in some embodiments, the basebandcircuitry 410 includes individual processing device(s) to operate one ormore wireless communication protocols (e.g., a “multi-protocol basebandprocessor” or “protocol processing circuitry”) and individual processingdevice(s) to implement PHY layer functions. In these embodiments, thePHY layer functions include the aforementioned radio control functions.In these embodiments, the protocol processing circuitry operates orimplements various protocol layers/entities of one or more wirelesscommunication protocols. In a first example, the protocol processingcircuitry may operate LTE protocol entities and/or 5G/NR protocolentities when the baseband circuitry 410 and/or RF circuitry 406 arepart of mmWave communication circuitry or some other suitable cellularcommunication circuitry. In the first example, the protocol processingcircuitry would operate MAC, RLC, PDCP, SDAP, RRC, and NAS functions. Ina second example, the protocol processing circuitry may operate one ormore IEEE-based protocols when the baseband circuitry 410 and/or RFcircuitry 406 are part of a Wi-Fi communication system. In the secondexample, the protocol processing circuitry would operate Wi-Fi MAC andlogical link control (LLC) functions. The protocol processing circuitrymay include one or more memory structures (e.g., 404G) to store programcode and data for operating the protocol functions, as well as one ormore processing cores to execute the program code and perform variousoperations using the data. The baseband circuitry 410 may also supportradio communications for more than one wireless protocol.

The various hardware elements of the baseband circuitry 410 discussedherein may be implemented, for example, as a solder-down substrateincluding one or more integrated circuits (ICs), a single packaged ICsoldered to a main circuit board or a multi-chip module containing twoor more ICs. In one example, the components of the baseband circuitry410 may be suitably combined in a single chip or chipset, or disposed ona same circuit board. In another example, some or all of the constituentcomponents of the baseband circuitry 410 and RF circuitry 406 may beimplemented together such as, for example, a system on a chip (SoC) orSystem-in-Package (SiP). In another example, some or all of theconstituent components of the baseband circuitry 410 may be implementedas a separate SoC that is communicatively coupled with and RF circuitry406 (or multiple instances of RF circuitry 406). In yet another example,some or all of the constituent components of the baseband circuitry 410and the application circuitry 205/305 may be implemented together asindividual SoCs mounted to a same circuit board (e.g., a “multi-chippackage”).

In some embodiments, the baseband circuitry 410 may provide forcommunication compatible with one or more radio technologies. Forexample, in some embodiments, the baseband circuitry 410 may supportcommunication with an E-UTRAN or other WMAN, a WLAN, a WPAN. Embodimentsin which the baseband circuitry 410 is configured to support radiocommunications of more than one wireless protocol may be referred to asmulti-mode baseband circuitry.

RF circuitry 406 may enable communication with wireless networks usingmodulated electromagnetic radiation through a non-solid medium. Invarious embodiments, the RF circuitry 406 may include switches, filters,amplifiers, etc. to facilitate the communication with the wirelessnetwork. RF circuitry 406 may include a receive signal path, which mayinclude circuitry to down-convert RF signals received from the FEMcircuitry 408 and provide baseband signals to the baseband circuitry410. RF circuitry 406 may also include a transmit signal path, which mayinclude circuitry to up-convert baseband signals provided by thebaseband circuitry 410 and provide RF output signals to the FEMcircuitry 408 for transmission.

In some embodiments, the receive signal path of the RF circuitry 406 mayinclude mixer circuitry 406 a, amplifier circuitry 406 b and filtercircuitry 406 c. In some embodiments, the transmit signal path of the RFcircuitry 406 may include filter circuitry 406 c and mixer circuitry 406a. RF circuitry 406 may also include synthesizer circuitry 406 d forsynthesizing a frequency for use by the mixer circuitry 406 a of thereceive signal path and the transmit signal path. In some embodiments,the mixer circuitry 406 a of the receive signal path may be configuredto down-convert RF signals received from the FEM circuitry 408 based onthe synthesized frequency provided by synthesizer circuitry 406 d. Theamplifier circuitry 406 b may be configured to amplify thedown-converted signals and the filter circuitry 406 c may be a low-passfilter (LPF) or band-pass filter (BPF) configured to remove unwantedsignals from the down-converted signals to generate output basebandsignals. Output baseband signals may be provided to the basebandcircuitry 410 for further processing. In some embodiments, the outputbaseband signals may be zero-frequency baseband signals, although thisis not a requirement. In some embodiments, mixer circuitry 406 a of thereceive signal path may comprise passive mixers, although the scope ofthe embodiments is not limited in this respect.

In some embodiments, the mixer circuitry 406 a of the transmit signalpath may be configured to up-convert input baseband signals based on thesynthesized frequency provided by the synthesizer circuitry 406 d togenerate RF output signals for the FEM circuitry 408. The basebandsignals may be provided by the baseband circuitry 410 and may befiltered by filter circuitry 406 c.

In some embodiments, the mixer circuitry 406 a of the receive signalpath and the mixer circuitry 406 a of the transmit signal path mayinclude two or more mixers and may be arranged for quadraturedownconversion and upconversion, respectively. In some embodiments, themixer circuitry 406 a of the receive signal path and the mixer circuitry406 a of the transmit signal path may include two or more mixers and maybe arranged for image rejection (e.g., Hartley image rejection). In someembodiments, the mixer circuitry 406 a of the receive signal path andthe mixer circuitry 406 a of the transmit signal path may be arrangedfor direct downconversion and direct upconversion, respectively. In someembodiments, the mixer circuitry 406 a of the receive signal path andthe mixer circuitry 406 a of the transmit signal path may be configuredfor super-heterodyne operation.

In some embodiments, the output baseband signals and the input basebandsignals may be analog baseband signals, although the scope of theembodiments is not limited in this respect. In some alternateembodiments, the output baseband signals and the input baseband signalsmay be digital baseband signals. In these alternate embodiments, the RFcircuitry 406 may include analog-to-digital converter (ADC) anddigital-to-analog converter (DAC) circuitry and the baseband circuitry410 may include a digital baseband interface to communicate with the RFcircuitry 406.

In some dual-mode embodiments, a separate radio IC circuitry may beprovided for processing signals for each spectrum, although the scope ofthe embodiments is not limited in this respect.

In some embodiments, the synthesizer circuitry 406 d may be afractional-N synthesizer or a fractional N/N+1 synthesizer, although thescope of the embodiments is not limited in this respect as other typesof frequency synthesizers may be suitable. For example, synthesizercircuitry 406 d may be a delta-sigma synthesizer, a frequencymultiplier, or a synthesizer comprising a phase-locked loop with afrequency divider.

The synthesizer circuitry 406 d may be configured to synthesize anoutput frequency for use by the mixer circuitry 406 a of the RFcircuitry 406 based on a frequency input and a divider control input. Insome embodiments, the synthesizer circuitry 406 d may be a fractionalN/N+1 synthesizer.

In some embodiments, frequency input may be provided by a voltagecontrolled oscillator (VCO), although that is not a requirement. Dividercontrol input may be provided by either the baseband circuitry 410 orthe application circuitry 205/305 depending on the desired outputfrequency. In some embodiments, a divider control input (e.g., N) may bedetermined from a look-up table based on a channel indicated by theapplication circuitry 205/305.

Synthesizer circuitry 406 d of the RF circuitry 406 may include adivider, a delay-locked loop (DLL), a multiplexer and a phaseaccumulator. In some embodiments, the divider may be a dual modulusdivider (DMD) and the phase accumulator may be a digital phaseaccumulator (DPA). In some embodiments, the DMD may be configured todivide the input signal by either N or N+1 (e.g., based on a carry out)to provide a fractional division ratio. In some example embodiments, theDLL may include a set of cascaded, tunable, delay elements, a phasedetector, a charge pump and a D-type flip-flop. In these embodiments,the delay elements may be configured to break a VCO period up into Ndequal packets of phase, where Nd is the number of delay elements in thedelay line. In this way, the DLL provides negative feedback to helpensure that the total delay through the delay line is one VCO cycle.

In some embodiments, synthesizer circuitry 406 d may be configured togenerate a carrier frequency as the output frequency, while in otherembodiments, the output frequency may be a multiple of the carrierfrequency (e.g., twice the carrier frequency, four times the carrierfrequency) and used in conjunction with quadrature generator and dividercircuitry to generate multiple signals at the carrier frequency withmultiple different phases with respect to each other. In someembodiments, the output frequency may be a LO frequency (fLO). In someembodiments, the RF circuitry 406 may include an IQ/polar converter.

FEM circuitry 408 may include a receive signal path, which may includecircuitry configured to operate on RF signals received from antennaarray 411, amplify the received signals and provide the amplifiedversions of the received signals to the RF circuitry 406 for furtherprocessing. FEM circuitry 408 may also include a transmit signal path,which may include circuitry configured to amplify signals fortransmission provided by the RF circuitry 406 for transmission by one ormore of antenna elements of antenna array 411. In various embodiments,the amplification through the transmit or receive signal paths may bedone solely in the RF circuitry 406, solely in the FEM circuitry 408, orin both the RF circuitry 406 and the FEM circuitry 408.

In some embodiments, the FEM circuitry 408 may include a TX/RX switch toswitch between transmit mode and receive mode operation. The FEMcircuitry 408 may include a receive signal path and a transmit signalpath. The receive signal path of the FEM circuitry 408 may include anLNA to amplify received RF signals and provide the amplified received RFsignals as an output (e.g., to the RF circuitry 406). The transmitsignal path of the FEM circuitry 408 may include a power amplifier (PA)to amplify input RF signals (e.g., provided by RF circuitry 406), andone or more filters to generate RF signals for subsequent transmissionby one or more antenna elements of the antenna array 411.

The antenna array 411 comprises one or more antenna elements, each ofwhich is configured convert electrical signals into radio waves totravel through the air and to convert received radio waves intoelectrical signals. For example, digital baseband signals provided bythe baseband circuitry 410 is converted into analog RF signals (e.g.,modulated waveform) that will be amplified and transmitted via theantenna elements of the antenna array 411 including one or more antennaelements (not shown). The antenna elements may be omnidirectional,direction, or a combination thereof. The antenna elements may be formedin a multitude of arranges as are known and/or discussed herein. Theantenna array 411 may comprise microstrip antennas or printed antennasthat are fabricated on the surface of one or more printed circuitboards. The antenna array 411 may be formed in as a patch of metal foil(e.g., a patch antenna) in a variety of shapes, and may be coupled withthe RF circuitry 406 and/or FEM circuitry 408 using metal transmissionlines or the like.

Processors of the application circuitry 205/305 and processors of thebaseband circuitry 410 may be used to execute elements of one or moreinstances of a protocol stack. For example, processors of the basebandcircuitry 410, alone or in combination, may be used execute Layer 3,Layer 2, or Layer 1 functionality, while processors of the applicationcircuitry 205/305 may utilize data (e.g., packet data) received fromthese layers and further execute Layer 4 functionality (e.g., TCP andUDP layers). As referred to herein, Layer 3 may comprise a RRC layer,described in further detail below. As referred to herein, Layer 2 maycomprise a MAC layer, an RLC layer, and a PDCP layer, described infurther detail below. As referred to herein, Layer 1 may comprise a PHYlayer of a UE/RAN node, described in further detail below.

FIG. 5 is a block diagram illustrating components, according to someexample embodiments, able to read instructions from a machine-readableor computer-readable medium (e.g., a non-transitory machine-readablestorage medium) and perform any one or more of the methodologiesdiscussed herein. Specifically, FIG. 5 shows a diagrammaticrepresentation of hardware resources 500 including one or moreprocessors (or processor cores) 510, one or more memory/storage devices520, and one or more communication resources 530, each of which may becommunicatively coupled via a bus 540. For embodiments where nodevirtualization (e.g., NFV) is utilized, a hypervisor 502 may be executedto provide an execution environment for one or more networkslices/sub-slices to utilize the hardware resources 500.

The processors 510 may include, for example, a processor 512 and aprocessor 514. The processor(s) 510 may be, for example, a centralprocessing unit (CPU), a reduced instruction set computing (RISC)processor, a complex instruction set computing (CISC) processor, agraphics processing unit (GPU), a DSP such as a baseband processor, anASIC, an FPGA, a radio-frequency integrated circuit (RFIC), anotherprocessor (including those discussed herein), or any suitablecombination thereof.

The memory/storage devices 520 may include main memory, disk storage, orany suitable combination thereof. The memory/storage devices 520 mayinclude, but are not limited to, any type of volatile or nonvolatilememory such as dynamic random access memory (DRAM), static random accessmemory (SRAM), erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM),electrically erasable programmable read-only memory (EEPROM), Flashmemory, solid-state storage, etc.

The communication resources 530 may include interconnection or networkinterface components or other suitable devices to communicate with oneor more peripheral devices 504 or one or more databases 506 via anetwork 508. For example, the communication resources 530 may includewired communication components (e.g., for coupling via USB), cellularcommunication components, NFC components, Bluetooth® (or Bluetooth® LowEnergy) components, WiFi® components, and other communicationcomponents.

Instructions 550 may comprise software, a program, an application, anapplet, an app, or other executable code for causing at least any of theprocessors 510 to perform any one or more of the methodologies discussedherein. The instructions 550 may reside, completely or partially, withinat least one of the processors 510 (e.g., within the processor's cachememory), the memory/storage devices 520, or any suitable combinationthereof. Furthermore, any portion of the instructions 550 may betransferred to the hardware resources 500 from any combination of theperipheral devices 504 or the databases 506. Accordingly, the memory ofprocessors 510, the memory/storage devices 520, the peripheral devices504, and the databases 506 are examples of computer-readable andmachine-readable media.

Protocol Layers

FIG. 6 illustrates various protocol functions that may be implemented ina wireless communication device according to various exemplaryembodiments. In particular, FIG. 6 includes an arrangement 600 showinginterconnections between various protocol layers/entities. The followingdescription of FIG. 6 is provided for various protocol layers/entitiesthat operate in conjunction with the 5G/NR system standards and LTEsystem standards, but some or all of the aspects of FIG. 6 may beapplicable to other wireless communication network systems as well.

The protocol layers of arrangement 600 may include one or more of PHY610, MAC 620, RLC 630, PDCP 640, SDAP 647, RRC 655, and NAS layer 657,in addition to other higher layer functions not illustrated. Theprotocol layers may include one or more service access points (SAPs)(e.g., items 659, 656, 650, 649, 645, 635, 625, and 615 in FIG. 6 ) thatmay provide communication between two or more protocol layers.

The PHY 610 may transmit and receive physical layer signals 605 that maybe received from or transmitted to one or more other communicationdevices. The physical layer signals 605 may comprise one or morephysical channels, such as those discussed herein. The PHY 610 mayfurther perform link adaptation or adaptive modulation and coding (AMC),power control, cell search (e.g., for initial synchronization andhandover purposes), and other measurements used by higher layers, suchas the RRC 655. The PHY 610 may still further perform error detection onthe transport channels, forward error correction (FEC) coding/decodingof the transport channels, modulation/demodulation of physical channels,interleaving, rate matching, mapping onto physical channels, and MIMOantenna processing. In embodiments, an instance of PHY 610 may processrequests from and provide indications to an instance of MAC 620 via oneor more PHY-SAP 615. According to some embodiments, requests andindications communicated via PHY-SAP 615 may comprise one or moretransport channels.

Instance(s) of MAC 620 may process requests from, and provideindications to, an instance of RLC 630 via one or more MAC-SAPs 625.These requests and indications communicated via the MAC-SAP 625 maycomprise one or more logical channels. The MAC 620 may perform mappingbetween the logical channels and transport channels, multiplexing of MACSDUs from one or more logical channels onto TBs to be delivered to PHY610 via the transport channels, de-multiplexing MAC SDUs to one or morelogical channels from TBs delivered from the PHY 610 via transportchannels, multiplexing MAC SDUs onto TBs, scheduling informationreporting, error correction through HARQ, and logical channelprioritization.

Instance(s) of RLC 630 may process requests from and provide indicationsto an instance of PDCP 640 via one or more radio link control serviceaccess points (RLC-SAP) 635. These requests and indications communicatedvia RLC-SAP 635 may comprise one or more RLC channels. The RLC 630 mayoperate in a plurality of modes of operation, including: TransparentMode (TM), Unacknowledged Mode (UM), and Acknowledged Mode (AM). The RLC630 may execute transfer of upper layer protocol data units (PDUs),error correction through automatic repeat request (ARQ) for AM datatransfers, and concatenation, segmentation and reassembly of RLC SDUsfor UM and AM data transfers. The RLC 630 may also executere-segmentation of RLC data PDUs for AM data transfers, reorder RLC dataPDUs for UM and AM data transfers, detect duplicate data for UM and AMdata transfers, discard RLC SDUs for UM and AM data transfers, detectprotocol errors for AM data transfers, and perform RLC re-establishment.

Instance(s) of PDCP 640 may process requests from and provideindications to instance(s) of RRC 655 and/or instance(s) of SDAP 647 viaone or more packet data convergence protocol service access points(PDCP-SAP) 645. These requests and indications communicated via PDCP-SAP645 may comprise one or more radio bearers. The PDCP 640 may executeheader compression and decompression of IP data, maintain PDCP SequenceNumbers (SNs), perform in-sequence delivery of upper layer PDUs atre-establishment of lower layers, eliminate duplicates of lower layerSDUs at re-establishment of lower layers for radio bearers mapped on RLCAM, cipher and decipher control plane data, perform integrity protectionand integrity verification of control plane data, control timer-baseddiscard of data, and perform security operations (e.g., ciphering,deciphering, integrity protection, integrity verification, etc.).

Instance(s) of SDAP 647 may process requests from and provideindications to one or more higher layer protocol entities via one ormore SDAP-SAP 649. These requests and indications communicated viaSDAP-SAP 649 may comprise one or more QoS flows. The SDAP 647 may mapQoS flows to DRBs, and vice versa, and may also mark QFIs in DL and ULpackets. A single SDAP entity 647 may be configured for an individualPDU session. In the UL direction, the 5G NR-RAN 110 may control themapping of QoS Flows to DRB(s) in two different ways, reflective mappingor explicit mapping. For reflective mapping, the SDAP 647 of a UE 101may monitor the QFIs of the DL packets for each DRB, and may apply thesame mapping for packets flowing in the UL direction. For a DRB, theSDAP 647 of the UE 101 may map the UL packets belonging to the QoSflows(s) corresponding to the QoS flow ID(s) and PDU session observed inthe DL packets for that DRB. To enable reflective mapping, the 5G NR-RAN110 may mark DL packets over the Uu interface with a QoS flow ID. Theexplicit mapping may involve the RRC 655 configuring the SDAP 647 withan explicit QoS flow to DRB mapping rule, which may be stored andfollowed by the SDAP 647. In embodiments, the SDAP 647 may only be usedin NR implementations and may not be used in LTE implementations.

The RRC 655 may configure, via one or more management service accesspoints (M-SAP), aspects of one or more protocol layers, which mayinclude one or more instances of PHY 610, MAC 620, RLC 630, PDCP 640 andSDAP 647. In embodiments, an instance of RRC 655 may process requestsfrom and provide indications to one or more NAS entities 657 via one ormore RRC-SAPs 656. The main services and functions of the RRC 655 mayinclude broadcast of system information (e.g., included in MIBs or SIBsrelated to the NAS), broadcast of system information related to theaccess stratum (AS), paging, establishment, maintenance and release ofan RRC connection between the UE 101 and RAN 110 (e.g., RRC connectionpaging, RRC connection establishment, RRC connection modification, andRRC connection release), establishment, configuration, maintenance andrelease of point to point Radio Bearers, security functions includingkey management, inter-RAT mobility, and measurement configuration for UEmeasurement reporting. The MIBs and SIBs may comprise one or more IEs,which may each comprise individual data fields or data structures.

The NAS 657 may form the highest stratum of the control plane betweenthe UE 101 and the AMF. The NAS 657 may support the mobility of the UEs101 and the session management procedures to establish and maintain IPconnectivity between the UE 101 and a P-GW in LTE systems.

According to various embodiments, one or more protocol entities ofarrangement 600 may be implemented in UEs 101, RAN nodes 111, the AMF inNR implementations or the MME in LTE implementations, UPFs in NRimplementations or S-GWs and P-GWs in LTE implementations, or the liketo be used for control plane or user plane communications protocol stackbetween the aforementioned devices. In such embodiments, one or moreprotocol entities that may be implemented in one or more of UE 101, gNB111, the AMF, etc. may communicate with a respective peer protocolentity that may be implemented in or on another device using theservices of respective lower layer protocol entities to perform suchcommunication. In some embodiments, a gNB-CU of the gNB 111 may host theRRC 655, SDAP 647, and PDCP 640 of the gNB that controls the operationof one or more gNB-DUs, and the gNB-DUs of the gNB 111 may each host theRLC 630, MAC 620, and PHY 510 of the gNB 111.

In a first example, a control plane protocol stack may comprise, inorder from highest layer to lowest layer, NAS 557, RRC 555, PDCP 640,RLC 630, MAC 520, and PHY 510. In this example, upper layers 660 may bebuilt on top of the NAS 557, which includes an IP layer 661, an SCTP662, and an application layer signaling protocol (AP) 663.

In NR implementations, the AP 663 may be a 5G NR application protocollayer (5G NR AP or NR-AP) 663 for the 5G NR interface 113 definedbetween the 5G NR-RAN node 111 and the AMF, or the AP 663 may be an Xnapplication protocol layer (XnAP or Xn-AP) 663 for the Xn interface 112that is defined between two or more RAN nodes 111.

The 5G NR-AP 663 may support the functions of the 5G NR interface 113and may comprise Elementary Procedures (EPs). A 5G NR-AP EP may be aunit of interaction between the 5G NR-RAN node 111 and the AMF. The 5GNR-AP 663 services may comprise two groups: UE-associated services(e.g., services related to a UE 101) and non-UE-associated services(e.g., services related to the whole 5G NR interface instance betweenthe 5G NR-RAN node 111 and the AMF). These services may includefunctions including, but not limited to: a paging function for thesending of paging requests to 5G NR-RAN nodes 111 involved in aparticular paging area; a UE context management function for allowingthe AMF to establish, modify, and/or release a UE context in the AMF andthe 5G NR-RAN node 111; a mobility function for UEs 101 in ECM-CONNECTEDmode for intra-system HOs to support mobility within 5G NR-RAN andinter-system HOs to support mobility from/to EPS systems; a NASSignaling Transport function for transporting or rerouting NAS messagesbetween UE 101 and AMF; a NAS node selection function for determining anassociation between the AMF and the UE 101; 5G NR interface managementfunction(s) for setting up the 5G NR interface and monitoring for errorsover the SG NR interface; a warning message transmission function forproviding means to transfer warning messages via SG NR interface orcancel ongoing broadcast of warning messages; a Configuration Transferfunction for requesting and transferring of RAN configurationinformation (e.g., SON information, performance measurement (PM) data,etc.) between two RAN nodes 111 via CN 120; and/or other like functions.

The XnAP 663 may support the functions of the Xn interface 112 and maycomprise XnAP basic mobility procedures and XnAP global procedures. TheXnAP basic mobility procedures may comprise procedures used to handle UEmobility within the 5G NR RAN 111 (or E-UTRAN 111), such as handoverpreparation and cancellation procedures, SN Status Transfer procedures,UE context retrieval and UE context release procedures, RAN pagingprocedures, dual connectivity related procedures, and the like. The XnAPglobal procedures may comprise procedures that are not related to aspecific UE 101, such as Xn interface setup and reset procedures, 5GNR-RAN update procedures, cell activation procedures, and the like.

In LTE implementations, the AP 663 may be an S1 Application Protocollayer (S1-AP) 663 for the S1 interface 113 defined between an E-UTRANnode 111 and an MME, or the AP 663 may be an X2 application protocollayer (X2AP or X2-AP) 663 for the X2 interface 112 that is definedbetween two or more E-UTRAN nodes 111.

The S1 Application Protocol layer (S1-AP) 663 may support the functionsof the S1 interface, and similar to the 5G NR-AP discussed previously,the S1-AP may comprise S1-AP EPs. An S1-AP EP may be a unit ofinteraction between the E-UTRAN node ill and an MME within an LTE CN120. The S1-AP 663 services may comprise two groups: UE-associatedservices and non UE-associated services. These services performfunctions including, but not limited to: E-UTRAN Radio Access Bearer(E-RAB) management, UE capability indication, mobility, NAS signalingtransport, RAN Information Management (RIM), and configuration transfer.

The X2AP 663 may support the functions of the X2 interface 112 and maycomprise X2AP basic mobility procedures and X2AP global procedures. TheX2AP basic mobility procedures may comprise procedures used to handle UEmobility within the E-UTRAN 120, such as handover preparation andcancellation procedures, SN Status Transfer procedures, UE contextretrieval and UE context release procedures, RAN paging procedures, dualconnectivity related procedures, and the like. The X2AP globalprocedures may comprise procedures that are not related to a specific UE101, such as X2 interface setup and reset procedures, load indicationprocedures, error indication procedures, cell activation procedures, andthe like.

The SCTP layer (alternatively referred to as the SCTP/IP layer) 662 mayprovide guaranteed delivery of application layer messages (e.g., 5G NRAPor XnAP messages in NR implementations, or S1-AP or X2AP messages in LTEimplementations). The SCTP 662 may ensure reliable delivery of signalingmessages between the RAN node 111 and the AMF/MME based, in part, on theIP protocol, supported by the IP 661. The Internet Protocol layer (IP)661 may be used to perform packet addressing and routing functionality.In some implementations the IP layer 661 may use point-to-pointtransmission to deliver and convey PDUs. In this regard, the RAN node111 may comprise L2 and L1 layer communication links (e.g., wired orwireless) with the MME/AMF to exchange information.

In a second example, a user plane protocol stack may comprise, in orderfrom highest layer to lowest layer, SDAP 647, PDCP 640, RLC 630, MAC520, and PHY 510. The user plane protocol stack may be used forcommunication between the UE 101, the RAN node 111, and UPF in NRimplementations or an S-GW and P-GW in LTE implementations. In thisexample, upper layers 651 may be built on top of the SDAP 647, and mayinclude a user datagram protocol (UDP) and IP security layer (UDP/IP)652, a General Packet Radio Service (GPRS) Tunneling Protocol for theuser plane layer (GTP-U) 653, and a User Plane PDU layer (UP PDU) 663.

The transport network layer 654 (also referred to as a “transportlayer”) may be built on IP transport, and the GTP-U 653 may be used ontop of the UDP/IP layer 652 (comprising a UDP layer and IP layer) tocarry user plane PDUs (UP-PDUs). The IP layer (also referred to as the“Internet layer”) may be used to perform packet addressing and routingfunctionality. The IP layer may assign IP addresses to user data packetsin any of IPv4, IPv6, or PPP formats, for example.

The GTP-U 653 may be used for carrying user data within the GPRS corenetwork and between the radio access network and the core network. Theuser data transported can be packets in any of IPv4, IPv6, or PPPformats, for example. The UDP/IP 652 may provide checksums for dataintegrity, port numbers for addressing different functions at the sourceand destination, and encryption and authentication on the selected dataflows. The RAN node 111 and the S-GW may utilize an S1-U interface toexchange user plane data via a protocol stack comprising an L1 layer(e.g., PHY 610), an L2 layer (e.g., MAC 620, RLC 630, PDCP 640, and/orSDAP 647), the UDP/IP layer 652, and the GTP-U 653. The S-GW and theP-GW may utilize an S5/S8a interface to exchange user plane data via aprotocol stack comprising an L1 layer, an L2 layer, the UDP/IP layer652, and the GTP-U 653. As discussed previously, NAS protocols maysupport the mobility of the UE 101 and the session management proceduresto establish and maintain IP connectivity between the UE 101 and theP-GW.

Moreover, although not shown by FIG. 6 , an application layer may bepresent above the AP 663 and/or the transport network layer 654. Theapplication layer may be a layer in which a user of the UE 101, RAN node111, or other network element interacts with software applications beingexecuted, for example, by application circuitry 205 or applicationcircuitry 305, respectively. The application layer may also provide oneor more interfaces for software applications to interact withcommunications systems of the UE 101 or RAN node 111, such as thebaseband circuitry 410. In some implementations the IP layer and/or theapplication layer may provide the same or similar functionality aslayers 5-7, or portions thereof, of the Open Systems Interconnection(OSI) model (e.g., OSI Layer 7—the application layer, OSI Layer 6—thepresentation layer, and OSI Layer 5—the session layer).

SSB Patterns for DFT-s-OFDM Waveform for Above 52.6 GHz CarrierFrequency

As discussed above, for systems operating above a 52.6 GHz carrierfrequency, a single carrier-based waveform may be used to mitigateissues including low power amplifier (PA) efficiency and large phasenoise. In this case, when DFT-s-OFDM is used for the transmission of thePBCH, the SSB pattern and PBCH are redesigned.

Various embodiments for synchronization signal block (SSB) patterns forDFT-s-OFDM waveform for system operating above 52.6 GHz carrierfrequency are provided in the following.

In one embodiment of the invention, a DFT-s-OFDM waveform may beemployed for the transmission of the PBCH. Further, the PBCH andassociated demodulation reference signal (DM-RS) are multiplexed in atime division multiplexing (TDM) manner. Note that the PBCH can span K1symbol(s) and its associated DMRS can span K2 symbols(s), where K1 andK2 are constant, e.g., K1=1 and K2=1 or 2.

Further, the PBCH and its associated DMRS can occupy N1 PRBs and thePSS/SSS can occupy N2 PRBs, where N1 and N2 are constant. N1 and N2 maybe the same or different. In one example, in case when K1=K2=1, N1=36.In another example, when K1=1 and K2=2, N1=18.

FIG. 8 illustrates four exemplary options for SSB patterns when the PBCHand DMRS span 2 symbols and have different bandwidths from the PSS/SSS.In the examples shown, the PBCH spans one symbol and the DMRS for thePBCH may be transmitted before or after the PBCH. Further, the SSS maybe transmitted before or after the PBCH and its associated DMRS. It isnoted that other permutations of PSS/SSS and PBCH/DMRS may not belimited to the following examples.

In the examples, the frequency domain axis refers to the mapping ofsignals to subcarriers in the frequency domain. The signals that aremapped to subcarriers in the frequency domain are DFT-spread prior tomapping to the subcarriers in the frequency domain. FIG. 9 illustratesthe DFT-s-OFDM waveform for the transmission of the PBCH.

FIG. 10 illustrates examples of SSB patterns when the PBCH and DMRS span3 symbols and have the same bandwidth as the PSS/SSS. It is noted that,similar to NR in Rel-15, some unused REs may be reserved on each side ofthe PSS and SSS transmission in situations where the length of thePSS/SSS is less than the number of REs allocated for the PSS/SSS.

In the examples, the PBCH spans two symbols and the DMRS for the PBCHmay be transmitted before or after the PBCH. Further, a same bandwidthis allocated for the transmission of the PBCH/DMRS and the PSS/SSS.

FIG. 11 illustrates examples of SSB patterns when the PBCH and DMRS span3 symbols and have different bandwidths from the PSS/SSS. In theexamples, the PBCH spans two symbols and the DMRS for the PBCH may betransmitted before or after the PBCH. Further, different bandwidths areallocated for the transmission of the PBCH/DMRS and the PSS/SSS.

In another embodiment, given the condition that the DFT-s-OFDM waveformis used for DL transmission for system operations above 52.6 GHz, theSSB may not be multiplexed with other DL signals/channels in a frequencydivision multiplexing (FDM) manner. In other words, power boosting maybe applied for the transmission of the PSS/SSS and the PBCH.

In still another embodiment, similar to the SSB pattern as defined inRel-15 NR, the number of symbols allocated for SSB for above 52.6 GHzcan be 4. In particular, the DMRS may not be present for associated PBCHtransmission in the SSB but the channel for the PBCH may be referredfrom the SSS, which indicates that the UE may first detect the SSS andestimate the channel for the PBCH decoding. In this case, the samefrequency resource is allocated for the transmission of the SSS and thePBCH. Further, in this embodiment, the SSS can be used to carry both anSSB time index and partial cell ID information.

It is noted that the PBCH may span K1 symbol(s), e.g., K1=2. Further,the SSS and PBCH may span N1 PRBs, e.g., N1=18 or 20. In one option, ina situation where N1 is less than 20 PRBs, unused PRBs or subcarriersare reserved with zero power, which can match the SSB as defined inRel-15 NR.

FIG. 12 illustrates examples of SSB patterns when the SSS is used as theDMRS for the PBCH. In the examples, the PBCH spans 2 symbols. The SSSand PBCH occupy a same number of PRBs in the frequency domain.

In another embodiment, similar to the SSB pattern as defined in Rel-15NR, the number of symbols allocated for the SSB for above 52.6 GHz canbe 4. In particular, the DMRS and the SSS can be allocated in the samesymbol and multiplexed in a time division multiplexing (TDM) mannerprior to DFT operation. Similar to the above example, a same frequencyresource is allocated for the SSS and DMRS and the PBCH. In this option,the DMRS may be used to carry the SSB time index and SSS may be used tocarry partial cell ID information.

FIG. 13 illustrates examples of SSS patterns when the SSS and DMRS areused for channel estimation of the PBCH. In the example, the PBCH spans2 symbols. The SSS/DMRS and PBCH occupy a same number of PRBs infrequency domain.

DMRS Design for PBCH for Above 52.6 GHz Carrier Frequency

As discussed above, to reduce the PAPR for system operations above a52.6 GHz carrier frequency, a DFT-s-OFDM based waveform can be appliedfor DL transmission. In this case, a DMRS with a low PAPR property maybe used. Various exemplary embodiments of DMRS designs for PBCH forsystem operations above a 52.6 GHz carrier frequency are provided asfollows.

In one embodiment, a Zadoff-Chu (ZC) sequence can be used for DM-RSsequence generation. In particular, the root index and/or cyclic shiftof a ZC sequence for a DMRS sequence generation can be defined as afunction of one or more of the following parameters: cell ID, partial orfull SSB index, and half radio frame index. In one example, the rootindex of a ZC sequence can be defined as a function of cell ID, partialor full SSB index and/or half radio frame index. In addition, the cyclicshift of a ZC sequence can be predefined in the specification, e.g.,fixed to 0.

In another example, the root index of a ZC sequence can be defined as afunction of cell ID. In addition, the cyclic shift of a ZC sequence canbe defined as a function of a partial or full SSB index and/or halfradio frame index. In yet another example, only a part of the cell ID isused to define the root index of the ZC sequence and the rest of thecell ID is used to define the cyclic shift of this ZC sequence,potentially together with other parameters such as the SSB index and thehalf radio frame index.

In another embodiment, a max length sequence (m-sequence) or Gold codesequence modulated using pi/2-BPSK modulation can be used as the DMRSsequence. In this case, the expression of the initialization value ofthe linear feedback shift register (LFSR), used for generation ofm-sequences or Gold codes, includes at least cell ID. In some examples,the initialization value is based on the full SSB index and/or halfradio frame index or a part of the SSB index and/or half radio frameindex in addition to the cell ID. In other examples, different cyclicshifts of the m-sequence or Gold code sequence are used for differentSSB indices and/or half radio frame indices.

In another embodiment, a Bjorck Constant Amplitude Zero Auto Correlation(CAZAC) sequence can be used as the DMRS sequence. In this case,different cyclic shifts of the Bjorck CAZAC sequence correspond todifferent combinations of cell ID, a part of the SSB index or the fullSSB index and/or a half radio frame.

In another embodiment, the DMRS may occupy K REs within one PRB, e.g.,K=3, 4, 6, 12. In situations where the DMRS is not fully occupied withinone PRB, the remaining REs are unused and in this case, power boostingcan be applied. In other words, the relative power between DMRS and PBCHcan be 10 log 10(12/K)dB. Similar to NR Rel-15, different cells may usedifferent DMRS REs for DMRS transmission. In particular, a frequencyshift for DMRS REs can be v_shift=N_ID∧Cell mod(12/K).

FIG. 14 illustrates examples of DMRS patterns for the PBCH. In theexamples, the number of DMRS REs within one PRBs is 12, 6, 4 and 3,respectively.

In another embodiment, the sequence of the DMRS for PBCH can bedetermined by cell ID and/or SSB timing index. The SSB timing index canbe used by the UE to infer the location of the said SSE within the frameboundary. The SSB timing index may also be used by the UE to determinethe Tx beam identification for measurement reporting purposes. In asituation where the number of bits required for the SSB timing index islarge, a portion of the SSB timing index can be used to determine thesequence of DMRS.

It is noted that the above DMRS sequence design may be applied for theSSS sequence design. This may be considered when the SSS is used forchannel estimation for the PBCH decoding.

In another embodiment, the phase tracking reference signal (PT-RS) canbe associated with the PBCH before DFT to assist phase shiftcompensation for PBCH decoding. The PT-RS can be multiplexed in auniform or non-uniform manner. In one example, there can be N, e.g. N=2,PT-RS groups in an OFDM symbol, where each group include M, e.g. M=2,consecutive symbols. The sequence of PT-RS may be generated based onPi/2 BPSK, which can be scrambled based on cell ID and/or symbol/slotindex. FIG. 15 illustrates an example for PT-RS and PBCH multiplexing inone PBCH symbol, where Nsc indicates the number of subcarriers per RB.

The electronic device(s), network(s), system(s), chip(s) orcomponent(s), or portions or implementations thereof, of FIGS. 1-6 maybe configured to perform one or more processes, techniques, or methodsas described herein, or portions thereof.

FIG. 16 shows a method 700 for transmitting an SSB in 5G NR according tovarious exemplary embodiments described herein. The method 700 may beexecuted by components of a gNB for downlink transmissions to a userequipment. For example, in some embodiments, the process may beperformed by baseband circuitry, for example, baseband circuitry 210.

The process may include, at 705, multiplexing the PBCH and an SSS orDMRS in a TDM manner. The multiplexed PBCH and SSS/DMRS may be part of asynchronization signal block (SSB) that further includes a PSS.

The process may further include, at 710, transmitting or causingtransmission of, the PBCH and SSS by employing a DFT-s-OFDM waveform. Insome embodiments, the baseband circuitry may employ a DFT-s-OFDMwaveform by performing the DFT, IFFT, and CP insertion as shown in FIG.9 and described in the related description. The baseband circuitry maythen provide the waveform to RF circuitry, for example, RFEM 215, fordownlink transmission to a UE, for example, UE 101 a or 101 b.

For one or more embodiments, at least one of the components set forth inone or more of the preceding figures may be configured to perform one ormore operations, techniques, processes, and/or methods as set forth inthe example section below. For example, the baseband circuitry asdescribed above in connection with one or more of the preceding figuresmay be configured to operate in accordance with one or more of theexamples set forth below. For another example, circuitry associated witha UE, base station, network element, etc. as described above inconnection with one or more of the preceding figures may be configuredto operate in accordance with one or more of the examples set forthbelow in the example section.

EXAMPLES

Example 1 may include a method of wireless communication for a fifthgeneration (5G) or new radio (NR) system: multiplexing, by a gNodeB(gNB), a physical broadcast channel (PBCH) and associated demodulationreference signal (DMRS) in a time division multiplexing (TDM) manner;transmitting, by the gNB, the PBCH by employing a Discrete FourierTransform-spread-orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (DFT-s-OFDM)waveform and its associated DMRS.

Example 2 may include the method of example 1 or some other exampleherein, wherein the PBCH spans K1 symbol(s) and its associated DMRSspans K2 symbols(s), where K1 and K2 are constant, e.g., K1=1 and K2=1or 2.

Example 3 may include the method of example 1 or some other exampleherein, wherein the PBCH and its associated DMRS occupy N1 PRBs and aprimary synchronization signal (PSS) and a secondary synchronizationsignal (SSS) occupy N2 PRBs, where N1 and N2 are constant; wherein N1and N2 may be same or different.

Example 4 may include the method of example 1 or some other exampleherein, wherein a synchronization signal block (SSB) is not multiplexedwith other DL signals/channels in a frequency division multiplexing(FDM) manner.

Example 5 may include the method of example 1 or some other exampleherein, wherein a channel for the PBCH is referred from the SSS; whereina same frequency resource is allocated for the transmission of SSS andPBCH; wherein SSS is used to carry both SSB time index and partial cellID information.

Example 6 may include the method of example 1 or some other exampleherein, wherein DMRS and SSS are allocated in the same symbol andmultiplexed in a time division multiplexing (TDM) manner prior to DFToperation; wherein DMRS is used to carry the SSB time index and SSS maybe used to carry partial cell ID information.

Example 7 may include the method of example 1 or some other exampleherein, wherein a Zadoff-Chu (ZC) sequence is used for the DMRS sequencegeneration.

Example 8 may include the method of example 7 or some other exampleherein, wherein a root index and/or a cyclic shift of the ZC sequencefor DMRS sequence generation is defined as a function of one or more thefollowing parameters: cell ID, partial or full SSB index, half radioframe index.

Example 9 may include the method of example 1 or some other exampleherein, wherein a max length sequence (m-sequence) or a Gold codesequence modulated using pi/2-BPSK modulation is used as the DMRSsequence.

Example 10 may include the method of example 7 or some other exampleherein, wherein an initialization seed of the M-sequence includes a cellID, a full SSB index and/or a half radio frame index or a part of theSSB index and/or the half radio frame index.

Example 11 may include the method of example 1 or some other exampleherein, wherein a Bjorck Constant Amplitude Zero Auto Correlation(CAZAC) sequence is used as the DMRS sequence.

Example 12 may include the method of example 1 or some other exampleherein, wherein the DMRS occupies K resource elements (RE) within onephysical resource block (PRE), wherein K is a constant.

Example 13 may include the method of example 1 or some other exampleherein, wherein when DMRS is not fully occupied within one PRB, theremaining REs are unused and power boosting can be applied, wherein therelative power between DMRS and PBCH can be 10 log 10(12/K)dB.

Example 14 may include the method of example 1 or some other exampleherein, wherein a sequence of the DMRS for the PBCH is determined by acell ID and/or an SSB timing index.

Example 15 may include the method of example 1 or some other exampleherein, wherein a phase tracking reference signal (PT-RS) is associatedwith the PBCH before DFT operation.

Example 16 may include a method of operating a gNB in a fifth generation(5G) or new radio (NR) system, the method comprising: multiplexing aphysical broadcast channel (PBCH) and a secondary synchronization signal(SSS) in a time division multiplexing (TDM) manner; and transmitting, orcausing transmission of, the PBCH and the SSS by employing a DiscreteFourier Transform-spread-orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing(DFT-s-OFDM) waveform.

Example 17 may include the method of example 16 or some other exampleherein, wherein the PBCH is on two symbols and the SSS is on one symbol.

Example 18 may include the method of example 17 or some other exampleherein, wherein the PBCH is on two consecutive symbols and the symbol onwhich the SSS is carried is immediately before or immediately after thetwo consecutive symbols that carry the PBCH.

Example 19 may include the method of example 16 or some other exampleherein, wherein the SSS and the PBCH occupy a same number of physicalresource blocks in frequency domain.

Example 20 may include the method of example 16 or some other exampleherein, wherein the SSS is allocated in a same symbol as a DMRS andmultiplexed in a TDM manner prior to DFT operation.

Example 21 may include the method of example 20 or some other exampleherein, wherein the DMRS carries a synchronization signal block timeindex and the SSS carries partial cell identification information.

Example 22 may include the method of example 16 or some other exampleherein, wherein the SSS is allocated in a same symbol is a DMRS and theSSS/DMRS occupy a same number of physical resource blocks in frequencydomain as the PBCH.

Example 23 may include the method of example 16 or some other exampleherein, wherein the SSS is to carry a synchronization signal block timeindex and partial cell identification information.

Example Z01 may include an apparatus comprising means to perform one ormore elements of a method described in or related to any of examples1-23, or any other method or process described herein.

Example Z02 may include one or more non-transitory computer-readablemedia comprising instructions to cause an electronic device, uponexecution of the instructions by one or more processors of theelectronic device, to perform one or more elements of a method describedin or related to any of examples 1-23, or any other method or processdescribed herein.

Example Z03 may include an apparatus comprising logic, modules, orcircuitry to perform one or more elements of a method described in orrelated to any of examples 1-23, or any other method or processdescribed herein.

Example Z04 may include a method, technique, or process as described inor related to any of examples 1-23, or portions or parts thereof.

Example Z05 may include an apparatus comprising: one or more processorsand one or more computer-readable media comprising instructions that,when executed by the one or more processors, cause the one or moreprocessors to perform the method, techniques, or process as described inor related to any of examples 1-23, or portions thereof.

Example Z06 may include a signal as described in or related to any ofexamples 1-23, or portions or parts thereof.

Example Z07 may include a datagram, packet, frame, segment, protocoldata unit (PDU), or message as described in or related to any ofexamples 1-23, or portions or parts thereof, or otherwise described inthe present disclosure.

Example Z08 may include a signal encoded with data as described in orrelated to any of examples 1-23, or portions or parts thereof, orotherwise described in the present disclosure.

Example Z09 may include a signal encoded with a datagram, packet, frame,segment, protocol data unit (PDU), or message as described in or relatedto any of examples 1-23, or portions or parts thereof, or otherwisedescribed in the present disclosure.

Example Z10 may include an electromagnetic signal carryingcomputer-readable instructions, wherein execution of thecomputer-readable instructions by one or more processors is to cause theone or more processors to perform the method, techniques, or process asdescribed in or related to any of examples 1-23, or portions thereof.

Example Z11 may include a computer program comprising instructions,wherein execution of the program by a processing element is to cause theprocessing element to carry out the method, techniques, or process asdescribed in or related to any of examples 1-23, or portions thereof.

Example Z12 may include a signal in a wireless network as shown anddescribed herein.

Example Z13 may include a method of communicating in a wireless networkas shown and described herein.

Example Z14 may include a system for providing wireless communication asshown and described herein.

Example Z15 may include a device for providing wireless communication asshown and described herein.

Any of the above-described examples may be combined with any otherexample (or combination of examples), unless explicitly statedotherwise. The foregoing description of one or more implementationsprovides illustration and description, but is not intended to beexhaustive or to limit the scope of embodiments to the precise formdisclosed. Modifications and variations are possible in light of theabove teachings or may be acquired from practice of various embodiments.

It is well understood that the use of personally identifiableinformation should follow privacy policies and practices that aregenerally recognized as meeting or exceeding industry or governmentalrequirements for maintaining the privacy of users. In particular,personally identifiable information data should be managed and handledso as to minimize risks of unintentional or unauthorized access or use,and the nature of authorized use should be clearly indicated to users.

It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that variousmodifications may be made in the present disclosure, without departingfrom the spirit or the scope of the disclosure. Thus, it is intendedthat the present disclosure cover modifications and variations of thisdisclosure provided they come within the scope of the appended claimsand their equivalent.

1-24. (canceled)
 25. A method performed by a user equipment (UE)comprising: receiving an orthogonal frequency division multiplexing(OFDM) waveform comprising a multiplexed signal, wherein the multiplexedsignal comprises a physical broadcast channel (PBCH), an associateddemodulation reference signal (DMRS), a primary synchronization signal(PSS) and a secondary synchronization signal (SSS) that were multiplexedusing time division multiplexing (TDM), wherein the DMRS comprises asynchronization signal block (SSB) time index and the SSS comprisespartial cell ID information; and demultiplexing the multiplexed signalto result in a demultiplexed signal comprising the PBCH, DMRS, PSS andSSS.
 26. The method of claim 25, further comprising: determining alocation of an SSB within a frame boundary of the demultiplexed signalbased on at least the SSB time index.
 27. The method of claim 25,further comprising: determining a transmission (Tx) beam identificationfor measurement reporting purposes based on at least the SSB time index.28. The method of claim 25, further comprising: determining a sequenceof the DMRS based on at least a portion of the SSB time index.
 29. Themethod of claim 25, further comprising: detecting the SSS in thedemultiplexed signal; estimating, based on the SSS, a channel fordecoding the PBCH.
 30. The method of claim 29, wherein the SSS and thePBCH are received on a same frequency resource.
 31. The method of claim25, wherein the DMRS and the SSS are allocated in a same symbol andmultiplexed using TDM.
 32. The method of claim 25, wherein the DMRSoccupies one or more resource elements (REs) within a physical resourceblock (PRB) and does not fully occupy the PRB.
 33. The method of claim32, wherein a remaining one or more REs within the PRB are unused andpower boosting is applied-to provide a higher power to the DMRS relativeto the PBCH.
 34. The method of claim 25, wherein the PBCH spans a firstnumber of symbols (K1) and the associated DMRS spans a second number ofsymbols (K2), wherein K1 and K2 are constant.
 35. The method of claim25, wherein the PBCH and the associated DMRS occupy N1 PRBs and the PSSand the SSS occupy N2 PRBs, where N1 and N2 are constant.
 36. The methodof claim 25, wherein the OFDM waveform comprises a DFT-s-OFDM waveformon a carrier frequency above 52.6 giga hertz (GHz).
 37. A processorconfigured to: receive an orthogonal frequency division multiplexing(OFDM) waveform comprising a multiplexed signal, wherein the multiplexedsignal comprises a physical broadcast channel (PBCH), an associateddemodulation reference signal (DMRS), a primary synchronization signal(PSS) and a secondary synchronization signal (SSS) that were multiplexedusing time division multiplexing (TDM), wherein the DMRS comprises asynchronization signal block (SSB) time index and the SSS comprisespartial cell ID information; and demultiplex the multiplexed signal toresult in a demultiplexed signal comprising the PBCH, DMRS, PSS and SSS.38. The processor of claim 37, wherein the processor is furtherconfigured to: determine a location of an SSB within a frame boundary ofthe demultiplexed signal based on at least the SSB time index.
 39. Theprocessor of claim 37, wherein the processor is further configured to:determine a transmission (Tx) beam identification for measurementreporting purposes based on at least the SSB time index.
 40. Theprocessor of claim 37, wherein the processor is further configured to:determine a sequence of the DMRS based on at least a portion of the SSBtime index.
 41. The processor of claim 37, wherein the processor isfurther configured to: detect the SSS in the demultiplexed signal;estimate, based on the SSS, a channel for decoding the PBCH, wherein theSSS and the PBCH are received on a same frequency resource.
 42. Theprocessor of claim 37, wherein the DMRS occupies one or more resourceelements (REs) within a physical resource block (PRB) and does not fullyoccupy the PRB and wherein a remaining one or more REs within the PRBare unused and power boosting is applied to provide a higher power tothe DMRS relative to the PBCH.
 43. The processor of claim 37, whereinthe PBCH spans a first number of symbols (K1) and the associated DMRSspans a second number of symbols (K2), wherein K1 and K2 are constant.44. A user equipment (UE), comprising: radio frequency (RF) circuitryconfigured to receive an orthogonal frequency division multiplexing(OFDM) waveform comprising a multiplexed signal, wherein the multiplexedsignal comprises a physical broadcast channel (PBCH), an associateddemodulation reference signal (DMRS), a primary synchronization signal(PSS) and a secondary synchronization signal (SSS) that were multiplexedusing time division multiplexing (TDM), wherein the DMRS comprises asynchronization signal block (SSB) time index and the SSS comprisespartial cell ID information; and baseband circuitry communicativelycoupled to the RF circuitry and configured to demultiplex themultiplexed signal to result in a demultiplexed signal comprising thePBCH, DMRS, PSS and SSS.